Sheep Led to Slaughter
by Paradigm of Writing
Summary: The cannons echo into the night. The shadows of blades dive back into the dark, only to rise once more. The threat looming closer, a doom foretold... it's unfortunate that the twenty-four poor souls never see the gun that's placed right between their eyes. It's the moment that the sheep has been led to the slaughter. They're all foes. The 4th Quarter Quell is here. (SYOT CLOSED)
1. A Lambasted Morning (Prologue I)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new story... and this is called Sheep Led to Slaughter, and it's my new Hunger Games SYOT. I have had some unlucky running-ins with a few of these stories, but there's been a point in my life now where I am physically ready to write one, no matter how long it takes, even if it is the only story I have to write for however long. There'll be about six or seven introductory chapters for OC characters, and then we'll move onto the tributes. Enjoy the first chapter, Chapter #1: A Lambasted Morning.**

 ***UPDATE* SO, the SYOT Awards for the SYOT Alliance forum in 2019 took place today and I was nominated and WON best story of the year, best subplot - which will be one focusing on the Capitol OC cast alongside the tributes, something you don't want to miss, as well as best sponsor gift given to a tribute, best bloodbath character, as well as best Interviewer and best Head Gamemaker! *shakes hands excitedly* YOU GUYS! That's unbelievable! :D Thank you so much for your support. To any new readers, I hope this has you stick it out till the end!**

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 _ **Lance Viel: Victor of the 79th Hunger Games P.O.V**_

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The sounds of drums in the deep cause him to awake. Lance Viel, victor of the 79th Hunger Games, jolts off of his position on the cold, tile floor. He places a hand to his head, groggily. What... what time is it? He cannot see his own hand in front of him, it's so dark. When he removes his hand from his head, it comes back feeling slick and sticky. Is that... is that _blood?_

He can't even recollect in his memory that last time he's seen blood, it's been that long. Twenty-one years at least... and now just in time for the 100th Hunger Games, the 4th Quarter Quell he's going to crash onto the floor and nearly break his skull. Lance tries getting to his feet, something twisting and his muscles screaming in protest. He crashes back onto the tile floor with a resounding slap, he hissing through clenched teeth. Something is just not cooperating today.

Since standing is seemingly not going to be the best option, he gets on his elbows and knees, crawling forward in the dark, blindly. Last time he did something like this, it had been twenty-one years ago, and there's a spear in his leg as he's crawling towards the landmine so he could chuck it behind him at the other tribute chasing after him. This should be easy, finding a light switch. He shouldn't have any trouble... right?

He keeps moving until he bumps into something. _Cabinet._ Once again. _Desk._ Once again. _Refrigerator._ Lance cusses to himself, rubbing his head. More coagulation of what he believes to be blood clings to his fingers, yet he cannot feel the beginning of a bump on his head. Last he checked, Lance goes to bed without taking a sip of alcohol - quite a first, he gives himself that - and now he's waking up in his kitchen, due to the feel of the tile floor, bleeding.

Lance hopes it's blood. He doesn't know what he's going to do if it isn't blood.

His hands grasp the solid, yet rounded feel of something smooth. A countertop! Due to being in the Victors Village, the Capitol spares no expense. Granite countertops, a lounge with a piano in the center, a warm fireplace, a moving staircase that could turn into an escalator... Lance cannot imagine living anywhere else in the district. Much better than the two bedroom, one bath, thousand square foot condominium he and his three siblings are squeezed into with their decrepit aunt. However, he has no reason to complain.

In District One, least there isn't a single citizen who can say they live in squalor, unlike his other compatriots who live in District 12 with nothing but ashes and rags to cover themselves at night.

Heaving himself upwards, hands gripping the piece of furniture, he struggles to his knees. Resting his head against the wall, he feels around with the top of his head for the light switch. Something juts out that does not feel like the blender or a strange obtrusion pointing outwards, so it must be the light switch. Using his left hand, he flicks the switch, and light bathes the room in a halcyon haze.

His worst fears, yet happiest assumptions are proven true, as he looks back from where he awoke. There's a puddle of blood in the center of his kitchen. However, the blood doesn't belong to him, or at least Lance believe it isn't his. There's also a dead animal in the center of his kitchen. He turns his head to the side, askew somewhat as he narrows his eyes at the sight before him. Yep. It's a dead animal, a sheep... poor thing.

However, the better question is why there's a dead sheep in the middle of his kitchen. Lance looks down at his body, a blush settling on his cheeks. Not only did he wake up covered in blood, presumably this sheep's blood... he's naked to top it off. His body, which is starting to slightly fade muscle wise, is unclothed from the top of his head down to the tips of his toes. How come he didn't notice that before?

Lance turns his body around to rest up against the counter, sighing heavily. The reason why his legs don't seem to cooperate is that there's a pretty good bite on his right calf, turned sideways some, blood still dripping out of the wound. What in the literal hell happened last night? As far as he's aware, he still didn't drink anything, and none of his other victors held a party or tried having him do anything asinine or out of character. After all, it's reaping day today. Lance is not going to mess something like this up without giving it a good thought.

His eyes widen.

Shit.

It's reaping day, and here he is, with a dead animal in his kitchen, bitten in the leg, and naked. What else could be erroneous about the scene, exactly, he intones to himself amusedly.

As he sits there, the pain starting to come back to him now, it hits him. Here he is, just a few hours ago, taking in some high level Capitol drugs - maybe it had been cocaine... he cannot for the life of himself distinguish between the two. Coke, sugar, baking soda, flour, heroin... they're all the same somehow or other. White powder to ingest - and then decides to steal a sheep from his next door victor's backyard and cook it himself in the middle of his kitchen. He probably does this because who needs to use a butcher when a victor who's known for a meat cleaver is right there?

Naked, he still cannot explain. Did he use his clothes to try and smother the poor animal?

His clothes aren't around the kitchen, and he does not want to put them on if they're soaked in blood. The sheep must've bit his leg and then he passed out from the wound, or either not having been hurt in such a long time, and then the animal dies due to their own blood loss. The meat cleaver he used is lying in its own puddle a bit away from the animal, as if Lance had thrown it away from him once he had been done using it.

Lance places a hand up to his forehead, breathing heavily. He can definitely say that this is the first time he's ever done something this stupid. Just wait until the rest of the victors from the Career pack gets a load of this.

He's going to have to, someway or other, get to the town square and stand on the Justice Building with the other victors. It mustn't still be too late, no one's woken up and no one's barged in yet. He's going to have to try and fix his dark brown hair into something presentable - Lance is sure it looks as if a muskrat is hiding out underneath the oak locks - and find some damn clothes.

However, Lance speaks too soon. The very next second, someone comes bursting through the front door, a woman's loud and commandeering voice booming out around the house.

"Lance Viel, where in the hell are you?" she shouts. He closes his eyes, smiling to himself.

There's nothing better than the angry voice of Kevia Janelle screaming at you at whatever o'clock in the morning. He hears her slam the door shut, high heels clacking off like typewriter keys onto the tile floor, and she's heading in his direction.

"Don't come in here!" he shouts, mustering the strength to try and get to his feet, collapsing again. When he's unable to persuade her, as the familiar wave of her blonde hair comes into view around the corner, his hands shoot straight to his crotch to cover up what no one else should be seeing.

Kevia Janelle, the victor of the 84th Hunger Games, makes an estranged sound from her throat when she sees the spectacle in front of her. "Oh my god Lance... I don't know what's worse. You naked, or the dead sheep."

"Gee, thanks, Kevia. You do a lot for my self-confidence."

She pinches the bridge of her nose, turning side face so her head is resting against the arch of the doorway, head nestled into the wall. "I suppose I don't even want to ask what's going on in here. Did you try and kill one of Emmett's sheep last night?"

"Maybe..." Lance chuckles to himself.

"Were you high?"

"More than likely."

"And is that why you're naked?"

"Doubt it," the victor responds. "I probably had someone over."

"Knowing you," Kevia turns her head to the side some, starting to get the smell of blood in her nostrils, the sight of a hairy Lance Viel now forever engraved in her mind. "That wouldn't be a surprise," there's a pause, where she fiddles with something on her dress that she's wearing. "However, forget the dead sheep and forget Emmett, he's not the one who needs to be with me at the reaping. It starts in half an hour and I was told to come and find you."

"I can't stand," Lance says.

She blinks, swallowing heavily, probably regretting the next decision she makes. Kevia turns, eyes staring straight ahead at the wall. "What do you mean, can't stand?"

"The lamb bit my calf," he points to his leg. Again, worse injuries in times' past, but Lance is no stalwart eighteen year-old again. He's a vivacious Career of District One now; things are expected of him. Yet, and Lance wears this like a badge of honor, he manages to fail the checklist, fail his district, fail the president - he's not too upset about that - and Panem in one fell swoop. "I tried getting up earlier and I couldn't."

"Are you expecting me to try and help you with that?" Kevia blinks again, her face not changing emotions.

"I kind of was hoping so..." Lance trails off.

"Forget it. I'll just say you died. President Calhoun will take that, knowing his dislike for you." She turns to go, high heels clicking and clacking.

Lance searches his mind, something, _anything_ to try and stop his fellow victor from walking out of his house. He doesn't show up to the reaping, Calhoun will napalm the entire village to oblivion. He does not stand disrespect for the tradition of the Hunger Games, a ritual deep seeded in his own family. Lance remembers wanting to volunteer, having been selected instead when the volunteer male that year dies of contracted STD's a few months before. He's thrown into some ring of ferocious wolves that are the other tributes, and he comes out a survived man, a changed man, but a learned one too.

Something to get Kevia to stop... what could he use?

"Please, Kevia..." he begs, whining almost. God, he hasn't whined like that since he had been probably five or six.

"Lance, I'll just get the Peacekeepers to help you up."

"If you don't help me up right now, Kevia... when I see Calhoun, I'll tell him about the necklace you stole from his wife."

The noise ceases down the foyer, he picturing the female victor turned twenty degrees exactly, head distended, jaw locked, until she turns her head to glare back in his direction. Her heels clank against the tile some more, and she is back into the fold, arms crossed over her chest, glaring.

"You wouldn't dare."

"I so would," Lance smirks. "Just imagine his face when I tell him you stole his wife's emerald necklace. His great grandmother gave his wife that necklace and you just snatched it away after a party. Why... I think he'd be the one to kill _you_ on the spot, versus me missing a reaping."

Kevia bites her lower lip, shifting off somewhat. He can see the way her eyes gently appraise over his body, although trying to be discrete about it is not going to help her. She's never been discreet... that's why her affairs are known all over town. Lance witnesses the battle that plays behind her eyes, an entire conquest of truth versus deception, saving her skin versus saving her fellow victors... and he's ensnared her in the palm of his hand. Like he's always done, and Lance is proud. Kevia is too easy for him, like a puppet that collapses due strings being cut, a laxness in the joints, an elixir of freedom in the gaps where flesh meets the vacuum of space.

She stirs uncomfortably, one hand going to clench the side of her leg, in the same exact spot where Lance had been bitten.

"Fine... but you keep yourself covered."

"No promises, sweetheart," Lance grins.

"You expose that filthy worm between your legs to me, I'll cut if off," Kevia glares.

"You're bluffing."

"Try me..." and then she cannot keep it up any longer, marching up to Lance, extending her arm out. He grabs it, and she helps lift him up to the floor, his spot luckily blood free with the dead lamb. One hand covering his nether regions, the other wrapped around Kevia's shoulder to support him, she and Lance hobble over towards his room. "Lance, I hope the Quarter Quell twist is not a thing where victors go into the arena, because you're completely out of shape..."

"Says the woman who can't even do a backbend anymore," he snipes back.

They reach his bedroom, Lance pushing open the door while he stumbles inside. Kevia stands on the other side of it, Lance having shut the door when he entered to get dressed, at least the best he can.

"So... what are we going to do about the dead lamb in your kitchen?" Kevia asks, scratching her head.

"I could actually cook it..." Lance suggests.

"You're morbid."

"Says the victor who killed nine people in her Games."

A pause, Kevia rolling her eyes all the while. "How's the bite? Do you need me to clean it for you?"

"No..." comes Lance's voice, the sound of a dresser opening and shutting, the withdrawing of some curtains coming behind the closed bedroom door. "It looks like it wasn't that deep..."

"You owe me one."

"Sure."

"I'm serious," Kevia's voice has the solidified tone of a slab of stone, rigid in demeanor, and it shall never move lest an earthquake disturbs its presence.

Lance pauses, filling the void with his empty breath. "Fine. What do you want?"

She smiles at the door wickedly. "President Calhoun's coat brooch. The one he wears for his interviews."

There's no silence on the bedroom side. "You're insane! Besides, that's a guy's ornament!"

"So? I still think it looks cool," Kevia shrugs.

"You're an animal."

"Says the guy with a dead sheep in his kitchen..." she bites down on her nails.

"A poor sheep led to slaughter..." Lance says, trailing off.

The remainder of the sounds coming from behind the closed door is him zipping up his pair of dress pants, buttoning a shirt, and seemingly turning on some water to splash his face. He stares at himself in the mirror, blue eyes staring into blue eyes, and on and on this cycle goes, a forever loop of azure, an infinity where the sky goes on and never meets its end.

"A poor sheep led to slaughter..." he whispers again, chills rising from his arms. He grabs a towel off to the side, wiping his face.

That's what he's doing right now, in essence. Kevia dragging him off to be killed by some sort of firing squad. To stand on the stage with the other tributes and let them be annihilated, where the gun is placed between their eyes and they never see the danger coming. A pig senses when it is about to be shot... he's seen the footage. A sheep? They amble their way into the hacking saws... the tributes run like hell to the bloodbath to be carved down by a vicious Career.

There's no going back, Lance realizes, throwing the towel down onto the counter. He marches over to the bedroom door, hobbling somewhat from the gait, the lamb's bite having not actually being _that_ severe where he's lame. Or it's all an act... he's going to let Kevia try and figure that out for herself.

It's time for a new batch of lambs, the Careers included. A batch of sheep led to the slaughter, with the cold, muted barrel placed between their eyes.

The sun is sitting on the horizon of District One... and with it comes the dawn of the 100th Hunger Games.

The 4th Quarter Quell is here.

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 **So... if you wish to submit a tribute or more to this story, please follow these guidelines! It makes the process so much easier for me.**

 _ **Here is the criteria needed for your tribute.**_

 **Name (First and Last)**

 **District (First preference, second preference, and third preference)**

 **Age**

 **Gender**

 **Appearance**

 **Family**

 **Personality (Be specific) (This includes likes and dislikes, sexuality preference if any, etc...)**

 **Weaknesses (Minimum of three; be specific)**

 **Strengths (** **Minimum of three; be specific)**

 **Weapon of Choice**

 **Reaping Reaction if Reaped**

 **Would this tribute volunteer? Why?**

 **Token**

 **Private Gamemaker Session**

 **Preferred Range of Tribute Score (1-4, 5-8, 9-12)**

 **Any Allies or Alliances?**

 **Preferable Placement?**

 **Cause of Death**

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 **I am going to have submissions open starting today, and they will not be over until probably December 21st... or I'll wait a bit and do December 26th (I'll be shooting for that ideal range. If your tribute has been already submitted to another SYOT currently in progress, you cannot use them. However, if said tribute is in a story that has been discontinued, you are more than welcome to use them. Tribute submissions will only be accepted by PM, no submissions via reviews will be taken. I will have the statistics of submissions broken down on my profile in the 2nd section, updated daily! The same criteria for submission will also be there too. I'll take two submissions top by you guys, so not to overwhelm the story with only four or five submitters tributes, fairness sake. It is not a first come, first serve basis: I'll pick the best tribute to fit each spot.**

 **Thank you guys for submitting if you choose to do so! I will update the story three more times from this one that will not have the tribute list, but the fifth update will include the tribute list at the end. I hope you guys enjoyed Chapter #1: A Lambasted Morning (get it?) and I will see you all for Chapter #2: The Joker's Palace. See you on the flipside!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	2. The Joker's Palace (Prologue II)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with the second chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, #2: The Joker's Palace. So far I have six tributes submitted, and we've met two District 1 victors Lance, and Kevia, and Lance is one strange dude. Woke up naked on his kitchen floor, bleeding due to a bite from a dead sheep that he killed, evidently a sheep led to slaughter. I hope you guys put those submissions in- I'd really love to have them! Enjoy the chapter!**

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 ** _Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis P.O.V_**

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She claps his hands together excitedly. The man who she's holding onto is unable to do anything except stare at her weirdly, any syllables he tries to utter blocked by the fact that he has no tongue. Her avox stares at the Head Gamemaker as if he's seen a ghost, the way the Capitol official bounces around her room in heels, mind you, not tripping on the expensive carpet. Unfortunately the avox is unable to move, body taped to her spinning chair in her office. He struggles, arms trying to pull up at the tape as the Head Gamemaker, Lewlyn Davis, spins around the room, hands clutching the violet, frilly dress that she's wearing which drops around her legs.

"It's Reaping day Rennie! Aren't you excited!" she asks.

He tries nodding his head, but a band of tape around his forehead keeps him locked in. She grabs his hands, nails digging into his flesh, but she doesn't matter, she's too damn excited. "It's going to be momentous, Rennie! It's a Quarter Quell!" Lewlyn exclaims, and she smiles wider than the Grand Canyon.

The Head Gamemaker rights herself up from the chair, walking over to the large stain glass window behind the desk. In a foray of colors, an aurora without the cold bands of sky, is an azure and amaranthine mess spilling over the mahogany wood and papers milled about. There are a few splotches of ink on the papers, blotted out and drying due to the sun. The room is oddly warm.

Lewlyn pauses at the window, adjourning it on two sides are clear windows where she can stare out onto the Capitol's main concourse, the train station running about, her citizens milling and looking all quite stupid. She holds the power here, not that foolish Calhoun, although he _thinks_ he does. President Calhoun Rodney of Panem, and Lewlyn undermines him every second she exists. She smirks to herself... with this Quarter Quell it'll all come clear. It does not matter that their president is thirty-eight with a gorgeous smile and bleach blonde hair. It does not matter that she's curvaceous, and a ginger - she's always believed redheads are the smartest in the world. It's odd that District 7 does not win as often, because of that - but looks are superficial, Lewlyn thinks. It's what on the inside that matters.

"Do you agree with that statement?" she asks Rennie, the avox sitting up as straight as he could, startled, having started to doze off. He gives her a look of panicked confusion, if there is such a look. "That it's the brains on the inside that counts? That's why I'm Head Gamemaker and not Calhoun. He doesn't have the brains for it." She doesn't care that he can probably hear her, where the president is marching around his bedroom slamming things into walls and probably hitting his slut of a wife. Lewlyn doesn't care, she's never have, she's never will. She's far better than him, and one day she'll be the one sitting there in that velvet chair above the street where the chariots come. One day...

She looks back at Rennie. "How come you never answer me?" Lewlyn asks, only to then slap herself in the face. "Oh, right, I forgot. I had your tongue cut out little brother."

Rennie, her avox, is Rennie Davis, her little brother extraordinaire, the up and coming Capitol violin player until one day he no longer is anything other than Lewlyn's little slave to do whatever she asks. It's all due to the fact he's better at her than something, which is playing the violin. His own wave of kissed-by-fire hair is resting against his taped forehead, sweat glistening off of the silver bands. She does this, taping him to chairs and forcing him to watch the reapings and deaths of the last games as a way to lead into the fresh new reapings and deaths of the poor lambs that'll be slaughtered in the arena. Until one remains...

Lewlyn remembers the day she tells Calhoun to go ahead and arrest her brother for forgery of an important document. Of course, it's silly, her brother Rennie has no idea how to write, he never learned, and with him being famous as a violin player, he has people to do his writing for him. She wants to make sure she's the one holding the tongs that keep his tongue in place as the surgeon then brings the blade down _switckity swack switckity swack_ until there's blood spewing everywhere and an estranged scream rising from her brother's throat.

She does not regret it.

It's enjoyable having peace and quiet. She's never been to like to share anything. Doesn't matter what it _is,_ if she has to remotely share it, she hates it. Spotlight, power, favorite toys, parents' attention: it all must be hers, and if it isn't, there's going to be hell to pay. As it says there's nothing like a woman who has been scorned, the path to hell is covered in Lewlyn's corpses.

She walks around Rennie, placing a hand on his shoulder. He looks up at her, terrified. She hadn't always been this way, contrary to popular belief or whatever the tabloids have had to say about her; Lewlyn likes the attention though. All attention is great, good or bad, and she'll make sure those that say the nasty, terrible things receive the same fate as her brother, and then are put in a casket that is thrown into the sea.

"Do you enjoy the Hunger Games as much as me? Of course you do, right? I'd hurt you if you didn't!" To emphasize her point, she pinches the back of his neck tight, like a baby cub getting picked up by the neck by their mother. He gives a slight murmur of protest, which honestly sounds like nothing, and she lets go. "You'd hate to make your sister upset, right?"

He nods feverishly, and she clasps her hands together again. "I'm glad to hear it! You'd never hear the end of it from me if you were against the Games. Do your other avox friends think the same?" Again, no response, and she clucks her tongue. "If only you could talk and had a tongue. Shame..." She likes to tease him, some would call it torture, but again, she doesn't care what anyone else thinks as long as they're dead after saying it.

The Capitol loves her, she can see it in their fear-laden eyes whenever she walks by them, as they call her 'beautiful, wonderful, mesmerizing.' Also twisted in there like a sawblade that spews guts out to linoleum floors is 'trash, hag, dirt, whore', but all Lewlyn has to do is snap her fingers and those people are now compost in the fertilizer than the cows in District 10 eat.

Ever since she had been a little girl, around maybe nine or so - Lewlyn is forty-three for reference - she wanted to do something with the Hunger Games. She'd never want to fight in it, like join the Districts are something outrageously stupid or nefarious, but a position in making sure the games ran as smooth as a whistle. There is something alluring to see a meek twelve year-old who has yet to hit puberty or speak to girls that is from District 12 then slit open the Career from One's throat while his alliance of the outer districts hold the brute down. She remembers the very first kill she had seen... and it is that blessed and beautiful Finnick Odair's Hunger Games that she recalls the best.

A bronze god - she loves him to this day - wielding a trident and a net and then killing... it brings waves of ecstasy to her already amazing life just thinking about it. No one has come close, but Katniss and Peeta were up there. In years past, recently, the male from District 9, whatever his name is - it's on the tip of her tongue, unlike Rennie's; his is burnt and thrown in the garbage somewhere far away from his body - wins by crushing a kid's head through a brick wall, and then separating his arms from his legs via tying them to a robotic horse that she designs. It turns out the District 9 victor, only fifteen, ends up committing suicide the very first day on his victory tour by using a Peacekeeper's gun to shoot himself in the head. Apparently, in his suicide note, it is the things the games do to people that drive them insane.

She thinks he's a wimp, and that is why his name is irrelevant to her.

Lewlyn walks back to her desk, sitting down in the other chair that she has, poor Rennie still stuck in his. There he'll sit till the day is over, and someone will feed him, bathe him, still stuck to the chair. "I miss the old games, Rennie. Don't you? Katniss and Peeta? Johanna..."

The 75th Hunger Games, that Quarter Quell... there is hushed whispers that President Snow is going to change the rule to be that old victors will go in to the arena and one shall escape. After Coriolanus succumbs to some mouth sores bursting open via a coughing fit, where Lewlyn is starting her internship for the Hunger Games Gamemaker positions, his son succeeds him, but he's nothing like his father. Some place out west, District Thirteen they called themselves, thinks this is the perfect opportunity to use the president's death as the opportune moment to step in the spotlight.

Lewlyn's never seen such an operation fall apart so terribly. Someone misfires a command, and there's a strange election that hires a crazed Capitol war mercenary who's nearly a hundred years old that wipes District Thirteen off the map. However, in the misfire, Katniss, Peeta, the other famed rebel heroes... they all go down swinging. Only ten victors from before, before the 3rd Quarter Quell are living, and sadly, as Lewlyn laments at night, clutching her pillow, Finnick Odair is not one of them.

On the rise comes Calhoun a few years after a strange power vacuum, an outsider not part of the Snow royal family or anything of the sort, and with his good looks and devilish mind, he's secured the presidency. Lewlyn makes her mark on the Gamemakers after Plutarch Heavensbee meets an untimely end with a shovel, a shotgun, and a pack of rabid dogs at Calhoun's behest. She's promoted from intern to a sitting Gamemaker for the 77th year, and then four years later, she's the Head Gamemaker calling all the shots.

Lewlyn taps her fingers on the desk. "I wonder what type of tributes we're going to get this year... the twist only makes it so much more interesting to see what pack we have? Based on its nature, we may get our first twelve year-old victor! Don't you agree, Rennie?" She waves her hand in dismissal. "Of course you do, I know you wouldn't ever disagree with me. Younger siblings always agree with older siblings."

Rennie tries saying something else, but she's had enough of his incompetence. "I can't stand you staring at me all the time. Want me to turn on the TV for you? Let's watch the reapings of last year!"

He goes to protest, this time by actually wiggling in the chair, but she no longer cares anymore what her brother tries to do. It doesn't matter. It is not as if he is going to be able to go anywhere. However, as Lewlyn puts the TV on, she does not pay attention to the silver screen, all the while Rennie keeps his head plastered to it, afraid of the repercussions should he even dare to look away. His eyes are as wide as saucers by the time everything she's done in the last hour, let alone the last few years has been. Rennie's been in her service for the last four years, and if Lewlyn's father wants to use choice words on her for betraying kin like that, she'll gladly do the same, except she'll then shove her father's severed tongue right back down his throat, watching as he chokes on the blood.

Lewlyn is not minding the tributes being reaped, a weakling from District 11, an eighteen year-old and still scared of their shadow, is the victor. His name is Machine Gollier, with lustrous charcoal skin that reflects the perfect glistening of sweat after he pushes the female Career from District 2 off a cliff to secure his victory. It is the only kill he makes, and immediately she dismisses any potential star talent and does not speak to him at the Capitol ball when the victory tour arrives. Why would she waste her time with someone who did not have the guts to pick up a weapon and actually kill someone? At his age? Please. He should've had the seventh highest kill record, underneath all the Careers.

She looks back at her brother, frowning. "You don't look happy. Why is that?"

Of course she knows why he isn't happy. As insane as the world views Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis, she knows she isn't stupid. There's an actual brain underneath there, one with cogs that works and spews sulfuric acid at those who deny her talent and brilliance. It is all in the manner at which she behaves herself and at the way she goes about things that brings the people to her, that has the bees flock to her honeysuckle arms to get just a mere taste.

Rennie has never once said he loves her. She says it to him all the time, whilst sitting atop him and looking at the scars in his mouth, at the serrated appendage as he's below her on the bed, clothes thrown to the side. She rocks her head back wantonly, moaning to the ceiling, Rennie looks disgusted, and she pats him on the cheek for good measure. He's her good boy, and she doesn't need a husband when the next best thing will be hers forever.

"Do you love me, Rennie?" Lewlyn asks, going back to her brother, hands wrapped around his neck, fingers plaiting into his pulse, squeezing, _squeezing, squeezing_ harder and harder and harder until there are black spots appearing in his vision, his own hands splaying outwards like webbed frog feet. When she lets go, his eyes still stay enlarged, and she brushes a lock of auburn hair out of her eyes. "I know you love me. You'd have tried killing yourself long beforehand if you didn't love me."

It is not that Lewlyn finds Rennie particularly attractive, she's better than him in the looks department from head-to-toe, but it is the fact he's available whenever she needs it, or whenever she forces him to need it too. A dog that'll let you pet it is amazing. A dog that will roll over and play tricks is the feeling of euphoria. A dog that will kiss you back and let you hold its paw as you rub him on his back is a slice of heaven.

Lewlyn presses her forehead against Rennie's, smiling. She'll remove the tape holding him back eventually, and even when she does, because he's so used to it by now, so conditioned... there he'll stay, until it is time to go and fetch her dinner, which certainly she won't go and get herself. Why would she? She's planning the 4th Quarter Quell after all, letting the last mutations have another look over before being deployed. Agreeing which weapons should go here and there and where.

"You do love me, don't you?" she asks again. "Oh, I wish you could speak. But if you did, then you'd go back to being better than me at something... and I just can't have that."

Lewlyn gets off Rennie's body, her own flushed with heat, sweat starting to trickle down her forehead. It is early in the day, the reapings have yet to begin, and she needs to go and change.

"Rennie... what dress do you think I should change into? The star one with all the extra lace down the back... or that backless silver one? I need to look good when Calhoun shows up so he knows how much prettier I am than his wife..." she throws a hand up in the air. "Honestly, I don't know why he's even with that backstabbing whore. We all know she's married and dated and slept with every man within forty blocks..." Lewlyn lets the rude, nasty comment flit to the wind, rubbing her forehead. "I'll go with the backless silver one. Thanks for your help, Rennie!"

She skips. Yes, Rennie's eyes do not deceive him... she _skips_ over to the door, the entrance to her office. One hand laces around the white edges of the wall, the other down by her side and Lewlyn locks eyes with her brother, a jolt of electricity traveling up his spine and into his head. "Today is the start of an amazing day, Rennie. Stay there and be a good sibling, won't you?"

Lewlyn runs out, and for the first time in the last three hours, Rennie's body meshes into the chair he's taped up to, now that she's gone.

He can only imagine the terror at the fact that this monster... this _beast_ , that is his sister Lewlyn Davis is the Head Gamemaker of a Quarter Quell, where things are supposed to be fifty times worse than anything else he can think of.

The saddest part... there's nothing else in the world, even when he lost his own tongue, that scares him more than this fact.

Those poor sheep... those poor tributes. They'll never see it coming.

They'll never see the gun between their eyes.

* * *

 **Okay... so that was Chapter #2: The Joker's Palace... and I just realized that our Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis, this OC I just created, might be the most insane, vicious, and evil character I have ever created. She's Head Gamemaker, cut out her own brother's tongue due to jealousy, made him her avox, sleeps with him because she can, taunts and tortures him due to his inability to fight back... and that's just on the surface. I can already tell how much I am going to love her. I also have never written a Hunger Games story with an avox as an actual character, so the areas I could explore with Rennie are something I am really excited for!**

 **Besides that, I hope you guys enjoyed this weird ass chapter and I hope you guys submit a tribute or two for the SYOT, as I think this is going to be some of my best work yet. I have seven tributes so far, and hopefully there'll be more on the way. Three more updates are left before I start the big guns, so let's get those submissions in! Remember, instructions are in the first chapter of this story, or on my profile, which also has the stats on it, so keep an eye on it while deciding what to submit so I don't have nine District 1 girls and 0 District 4 girls.**

 **Please review! I'd love to know what you guys think of batshit insane Lewlyn. I will have the next chapter, Chapter #3: Negative Intelligence, probably by the beginning of next week. Thank you all so much! Love you guys! Have an amazing day / night! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	3. Negative Intelligence (Prologue III)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #3: Negative Intelligence. Last chapter we met the Head Gamemaker, Lewlyn Davis and her crazed brand of totally messed up (go and read it if you haven't to see what I mean) and this time you'll get to look at two new characters, ones I am very excited to reveal. As I am writing this AN, I only have ten tributes submitted... and I really need submissions - usually I have more than what I know to do with - so if you could help me out and get submissions in, it'd mean the world. Enjoy the third chapter, Negative Intelligence.**

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 ** _Hale Cornerstone: Victor of the 87th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

She wishes she had a bottle of whiskey in her hand. Not that she specifically likes whiskey, it is moreso the first drink that pops into her head. She also doesn't want the drink just so she can a take a swig or fifty out of the bottle to help with her headache. Hale Cornerstone, the victor of the 87th Hunger Games, more than anything, wants to grab a whiskey bottle and smash it over a few of the Capitol citizens' heads that are around her. Their incessant babbling fills her ears like static white noise, blaring trumpet sounds that hail a new coming era of bloodshed. It's been thirteen years since she's picked up a sword, but Hale still knows how to swing it. If only she could have one right now and cut these foolish hens right in half.

It is partly her fault that she is surrounded by all these matriarchs of the Capitol, the Head Gamemaker non withstanding since Lewlyn Davis doesn't have any children of her own. Hale does not mind staying in bed, in her luxurious Capitol bed with the velvet sheets and the lime-scented linens, or the Avoxes that give her foot rubs when she needs it. However, she hasn't gone anywhere to get any sort of grocery so her fridge is practically empty, simply non-existent. So Hale picks herself out of bed, sluggishly puts on a bathrobe and slippers, and makes her way to the downtown world of technology and warped ideology.

There are countless restaurants and bars for her to pick from, yet she decides to sit in the worst place on the planet that she can find, while still dressed in a bathrobe. Hale hears all the things these old crones with witch-like, hawk-esque noses are saying. Their fingers are all dried up, like a tomato left out in the sun too long, necks with sagging skin off their fifteen chins. Some are dressed a bit plainer than others, but their hands are covered in jewelry, clunky rings full of fake stones and beads that droop down to the spare tires in their stomachs. Birthmarks and moles act like chickenpox, perhaps being distant cousins to the disease...

Hale wants to glare at them, but that doesn't matter, it won't do anything. She could march straight into Calhoun's office and demand retribution for these hags who dare mock her all because she's wearing a bathrobe, but that'll only cause trouble, or a hand on her thigh to close to the rest of her body. Hale wants to scream, she wants to go grab a sword, she wants to do all of these things... but she's just a victor from District 2. Not even then is she allowed to just go killing and hurting whomever she wants.

She's also not drinking, which is definitely a surprise to her. Yes, it's around midday. Yes, she knows that means she might be an alcoholic, but honestly, who even cares? Hale doesn't, clearly.

Yet, in a way, she does care, as she orders water, and then a glass of orange juice along with her crepes, digging in like some Seam boy who has never seen food, let alone Capitol food.

It is on her fifth bite into the cream cheese crepe that she realizes it's Reaping day, and she's not back home in District 2 like she's supposed to.

Hale promptly spews food all over the table, earning her a look of disgust from the bartender. She's also pretty sure these witches will have something else to say now, about her bad manners, but they could all go lie down in front of a truck.

She places a hand to her forehead in disbelief, starting to sweat. "Ellison is going to murder me..." she whispers to herself, her other hand clenching the napkin, a bunched up white ball of terror, the crease lines in her worried brow mirroring that of the balled up napkin. Hale closes her eyes, leaning her elbows on the countertop, pushing the plate slightly out of the way.

" _It's okay,"_ she tells herself, in her head. " _You can do this. You'll be fine. It's just being late to one reaping. How bad could it be?"_

On the contrary, as Hale is telling herself this in her mind, trying to massage relief and relaxation into her troubled soul, the horror stories she's heard from veteran victors in District 2 that miss the reaping, especially when they're helmed to mentor someone, dies in some way, shape or form from the elder District 2 victor, Ellison, who is nearing eighty years old and is still as fit as he had been back in his forties. Ellison Herring is the victor of the _38th_ Hunger Games, and sixty-two years later, he's still kicking, outliving Brutus, Enobaria, and all the others before / after him.

Hale, despite being a good fighter, is not someone who is good at keeping her blood pressure low. Not only will Ellison personally drive a spike in between her eyes, President Calhoun will probably rip all the skin on her hands clean off. Even though Calhoun is not the most bloodthirsty man she's met, he's a practitioner in tradition, and whenever a victor does not show up for their designated reapings... hell hath no fury like a scorned president of Panem.

"Hey, Hale... you okay?" a voice asks behind her, out of the blue, causing her to look up.

She frowns, turning her head back, but not her body, straining the muscles in the neck. Wiping a strand of dark black hair out of her eyes, she's met with the more weathered, yet still handsome face of a man she hasn't seen in over a year. A slight scoff of surprise emits itself from her lips, before she rolls her eyes, going back to her crepe.

"I thought it might've been some Capitolite who actually cared about me, but instead, it's just you..." Hale says, with a twinge of disappointment reflected by the tone following suit.

The hurt party, hurt rather badly indeed, holds a hand to his chest, raising his eyebrows in mock pain. "Hale, you wound me."

"Nice to see you too, Ari." Hale takes another swig of her water, placing one hand against her chest. The thrumming noise of her heartbeat in her ears is soothing, calming, reflective... _beautiful._ Her pulse begins to slow down, and she goes back to eating her crepe. Worrying about Ellison killing her can wait for another few minutes while she is accompanied by this gorgeous chatterbox.

Arizona Merviere, Hispanic in descent, with his caramel skin tone, and all-knowing emerald eyes, is all too damn good for even a stalwart like Hale herself to resist. She cannot stop the motion of a small smile tugging at the edge of her mouth when Arizona takes a seat next to her, covered in a shroud of light from the window behind him. He, being the victor of the 88th Hunger Games, is right behind her in terms of victor year, from District 10, and someone Hale, in a million years, did not think would ever co-exist with.

He drums his fingers on the countertop, a bit of an annoying action if Hale is a good enough figure on the subject of common annoyances, one eyebrow raised as his interest is piqued. Hale is back to eating her crepes as if he hadn't found her hyperventilating, blood roaring in her ears, heart on fire, as if nothing ever happened. There is never time for Arizona and Hale when nothing _ever_ happens between them.

His eyes fall over her for a second, noticing the bathrobe, which causes him to smirk. Ah, ever the charmer Hale is. She'd rather strip naked in front of a group of choir boys than actually put on clothes to go out among the Capitol citizens. If she's going to ever do it, it might as well be a bathrobe, right?

"So, you never answered my question," he starts, tapping the countertop again. "What's wrong?"

Hale has one hand wrapped around the end of her fork, the utensil slanted as she goes in to chip away at her breakfast, gaze directed down towards the granite bits of rock; she then sets the fork down, locking her jaw. "Totally just remembered that the reaping is today and that I am mentoring this year... and I'm not there..." she adds that last bit cheerfully.

"You afraid that old man Ellison is going to kill you?"

"You know of the tales too?"

"I talk to other people than _just_ you, Hale. You aren't that special..." there's a twinkle in Arizona's eyes.

She knows that the last bit of his comment is just a jab at her to try and rile her insides up, and sad to say, it is working. Two years ago, Arizona Merviere would not have made that statement. That means familiarity is coming into play, a feeling that makes Hale want to jump into an entire now body of skin, bone, and soul. Familiarity is incorrect, it is incongruent, it is... _terrifying._

"Besides," Arizona continues, "That Ellison is still alive? I thought he'd be dead by now."

Hale looks at her fellow victor with an ounce of shock added to her expression. "You act as if you hadn't seen him at the last year's Games. We both mentored last year... and same again."

He bats away with the criticism with a hand, scoffing. "I could care less who else was mentoring last year. I got to saw you, and that was enough."

She sets her fork down, placing the crunched up napkin, which had still been in her hands all this time, back on the table. This time, a mischievous glow appears in her eyes this time, striking cobalt rings surrounded by a plain of white and deepened by an abyss of black. "Besides, aren't you supposed to be in District 10 helping Hector? He can't mentor all alone."

"My brother will do just fine," Arizona shrugs his shoulders non-complacently, not having a care in the world. He's referring to his older brother, Hector, same last name and everything, who won the 77th Hunger Games, eleven years before Arizona did. "Besides, he knows I'm up here. I told him I had to do business."

"Business?" Hale's eyebrows shoot straight up, she lowering her head more directed down at her sternum, mouth slightly agape. "And what does that entail?"

"I'm currently doing it right now," and he gives her one of his iconic cheeky grins. Asshole. Bastard. Hale has already run out of insults... _dammit._ Why can't Arizona Merviere be an easy guy to make fun of? Instead, she's trapped in a flamenco with him, where he spins her in and out despite there being no actual choreography, holding her close while the fire snuffs out their brilliance.

That has to be an insult. "You're relegating me to _business?_ "

"Well, what else would I call my wife or the mother of my two children?"

Hale's eyes immediately widen, head looking around at the other people in the restaurant. The bartender seems to not have noticed that Arizona even said anything, let alone that the victor from District 10 is even in the room. She snaps her gaze back at him, startling him somewhat, her pleasant face now warped and distorted into an agonizing feel of anguish, even a bit of pain. Hale has reminded him time and time _and_ time again not to say those words out loud in any capacity in the Capitol when it is not just them two alone or just them two and a group of victors. Any other Capitol member takes notice... then that spells trouble.

She has no wedding rings to own, nothing stored away in cute little boxes back home. There's no official documentation that has not already been burned by the both of them left in any drawers or safes. All she has got, to declare her love for the current annoyance that is her husband sitting beside her is what lies deep down inside her heart. The words that are not spoken, the glances that they pass along to each other, the warmth in their gazes that linger for a second too long.

Every other year, since their marriage after the crowning of the victor of the 93rd Hunger Games, in which Hale has to fake a terrible ailment that knocks her out of commission to mentor the 94th Hunger Games, the two swap children, since on the eve of the victory tour coming into District 2, Hale births twins: one beautiful little boy and one beautiful little girl. It is unfortunate, it really is, that both children know of one another's existence, but have not corresponded in any way. Not through letters, no pictures... just word of mouth.

She extends her hand, gripping Arizona's and pressing a finger into his wrist at the nerve point, jangling him somewhat. "You know you're not allowed to say that out loud, Ari," and her voice drawls out into a hiss, tilting her head slightly. There's nothing worse than seeing, on top of Ellison probably killing her, and Calhoun probably killing her, would be the president ripping apart the sanctity of their union together, as the president would claim it is for the good of Panem that no two victors ever intermingle from different districts in such a way.

" _Fraternize with the enemy?"_ Hale scoffs to herself while in bed, alone, slumbering away without her everything by her side. " _I'm no longer in the Games. I am not a tribute anymore, fighting for my life. I can be with whomever I want, thank you very much._ "

" _No longer in the Games? Darling... we never stop playing the Game..."_ Arizona whispers to her in her unconsciousness.

Back in the bar, Arizona rolls his eyes, a soulful fire burning in her corneas as he does this. "Hale, stop overreacting. We're fine. I bet no one even heard me."

"It's too risky to take that chance!"

"Well, shouting out loud is not going to make the situation any easier, y'know..." he adds sarcastically, running a hand over his face.

Hale stands up from her seat, slamming the fork in her hands down on the table. "I am not going to sit here and let you endanger this..." she hurriedly packs the sides of her bathrobe, having brought her wallet to pay for her food. She slaps some currency down alongside the half eaten crepe, her glass of water, her glass of orange juice, and her bare heart for the world to see. "You're right... I have a reaping to attend to back home. I'm going to go back to my room, change and head to District 2 so I can head straight back here," she locks her jaw. "When you want to act like a mature adult who doesn't try to destroy the life he's built in the last decade, come and talk to me, and maybe I'll actually speak back to you."

With that, the District 2 victor straightens herself out, marching past him.

"Hale, wait!" Arizona shouts, turning around on the chair, hand outstretched in her direction, syllables beyond that trapped in his throat, only coming out as warm murmurs that seem to have semblances of earnest behind them.

"Goodbye!" she responds back, voice solidified and cold, jagged and uneven. It is a lance straight through his heart. He hangs his head low, sighing, then looking back at the rest of her breakfast. His stomach growls, and Arizona, against his better judgement, picks up the fork that is left behind.

Outside, in the sunlight, still dressed in her bathrobe, Hale marches over in the direction to her hotel, hot rage running through her body at the pace of a mile a minute. Sometimes... sometimes she just doesn't _know_ what to think anymore, about what goes inside her husband's head. How Arizona is able to relegate her, joke or not, to 'business' between a brother, who already knows of their marriage. To sit, in a crowded place where everyone besides yourself is an enemy, and everyone is also your friend to go out on a limb and just roll out the red carpet... Hale is never given a moment to sit and breathe. She's too damn terrified that Arizona will open his mouth and ruin it.

It is not going to happen any longer.

She's not some little lamb, a little, small, frightened sheep that has a shepherd guiding her through a field of barbed wire. She's not some little animal that is about to butchered up and made into pot roast as long as she keeps her head on her shoulders, spine extended back, fingers gripped tightly around the blade she'll use to protect herself.

Hale Cornerstone is not some sheep led to slaughter, due to negative intelligence of the people around her.

If Arizona wants to go around the Capitol and act like no one is out to get them, or that no one is watching them, then he can be her guest, as long as she's left out of it.

The lingering feeling of his lips on hers never will go away, just like the taste in the back of her throat of tribute blood, poor lambs with the gun placed between their eyes.

* * *

 **Alrighty! Another chapter down, and man, I am happy to be updating it! I have never done a relationship between victors from other districts like we have where people write Katniss/Finnick or Katniss/Johanna, but between OC's, and I like where it is headed. So, what do you think of Hale and Arizona, even though the former is the pulling focus of the chapter? Any idea what my quell twist will be? I'm really excited for it.**

 **Please submit, you guys, get those tributes in! I pushed the date back some, by a few days just to rein in a bit more than ending early, but I expect more on the way. If you've only submitted one tribute so far, submit another if you'd like! Thank you guys so much for reading, and please review, it'd help a lot to know you guys are following along and keeping up to date. I'll have the next Chapter, Chapter #4: Shadows on the Wall, out by Wednesday or Thursday. Love you all! Have a great night! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	4. Shadows on the Wall (Prologue IV)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #4: Shadows on the Wall. Yeah, this is like three days early but that's because I was struck by a sudden want to write some more and get this story out to you all, so let's hope it works. Last chapter we met another two victors, Hale from D2 and Arizona from D10... and there's more to come with the victor storylines. I'm going back to Capitol character directories here... so enjoy!**

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 _ **President of Panem Calhoun Rodney P.O.V**_

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Fingers plait against other soft tenders of flesh, joints curling upwards and into the soft barriers, lips connected to shoulder blades, the sounds of shifting fabric rustling in the otherwise empty room. All that escapes to the pallid white walls are soft exhalations of air that come from mouths often kept closed. Limbs are distorted and bent at awkward angles, ruining the lines, but the fingers keep on clawing at the ceiling, clawing at an ascendance beyond that of a mortal human being. A stasis of euphoria closer to that of a Greek Olympian.

President Calhoun Rodney, the egregious helm of all of Panem, currently has his mouth latched onto a specific part of a pulse in a mortal's neck, teeth nibbling at the skin, one hand raking down the other person's body, another holding a hand of theirs up towards the sky, having them dare to reach for the stars, heavens, and supernovas as well. His current rutting partner is his wife, Bonnie, she having tilted her head back, eyes shut in exultation, her mouth making soft, escaping noises that desire to be something other than the whims of sex and lust.

He does not know what time it is, but personally he is not all that interested in the manner, as he has his hands full and is not about to go and let free this precious moment stuck in amber. Today is a momentous day, and yes, he preaches following tradition, but even tradition could take the backseat to his wife's brilliance. Calhoun presses his backside up against his wife for a second, the friction and sudden explosion of warmth causing an edge of blizzard foam to appear at the corner of his eyes. With a resounding sigh, he lets go of her hand which is extended upwards, the other currently staying at her side while fingers splay out towards fingers.

Her free hand goes to clutch the one at his side, bones intertwining like black and white, cotton and gin, yin and yang... a tangle of paleness and bedsheets, a frame of Auschwitz in a polaroid. She turns herself around to stare directly into her husband's eyes, them being the same height, and she isn't in her heels. She wants to see him, to see how the corner of his eyelids slowly flicker upwards in a moment of transcendence. A smile plays itself onto her lips, a facial movement not going unnoticed by Calhoun, so he kisses her, making the smile grow larger and larger until it is bigger than the both of them combined.

"You," silenced by a kiss, she begins to speak, "Probably get..." another bite to the neck. "Going... Calhoun." The rest comes out quite quickly, so he doesn't go for something a bit more precious. It seems that the president has bigger goals in mind, trying to return another attack via the lips, but she gently presses a hand against his chest. Mountains move underneath the soft application of force. As much as she'd love to start another round of stretching underneath the blankets, her husband is still the president of Panem, and she's still an important Capitol official. "I'm serious, Calhoun. We should probably start finishing up and getting ready to leave."

He bites his lip, that precise moment meaning he's making a decision, one that goes on where battles are waged, skirmishes are fought, and no clear outcome appears despite there being bloodshed and carnage for miles. Calhoun locks his jaw, slightly jutting it to the left, lowering his head to look at her. "Did you just command the president on what to do?"

"I did, as a matter of fact," Bonnie places her hands on her hips, smirking. "Besides, you're _just_ the president. Don't let power get to your head."

Calhoun scoffs slightly, leaving his wife behind, they being pressed up against one of the walls of their bedroom. He wanders over to the nightstand in the corner by the bathroom, opening the buttons on his jacket sleeves, inserting the cufflinks into the appropriate places. He looks at himself in the mirror, straightening out his tie, a stunning silver on a white backdrop, surrounded by folds of an abyss that contains god knows what sort of monsters. He looks fifteen percent more handsome than he did yesterday, despite having a smudge of lipstick on his cheek and ruffled hair that sticks out like bolts of electricity.

A momentous day indeed, and no matter how much it hurts him to admit, Bonnie's right. The man who loves following rules and traditions certainly cannot just throw them to the wayside and expect the general populace, Capitolite or District citizen alike, to be okay with it. That is not going to fly. Besides, this is a Quarter Quell. The last Quarter Quell went to Coriolanus Snow, and he knows - the _whole_ world knows - how that went. There is not going to be any insurrected rebellions rising up from the ashes like a bullshit metaphor for a phoenix; there'll be stab wounds and strangulation marks and the beginning of something terrifying... but there'll be no upturning the apple cart at this point.

What happens in the next couple of weeks could decide his future, and rightly so. For the 50th Hunger Games, Coriolanus Snow is also the reigning president, and while nothing disruptive comes out of the outcome of the arena, that blasted drunkard Haymitch Abernathy still manages to make a scene and use the tools of the Capitol against them. Calhoun is unsure whether or not a Snow family member had been president for the 25th Hunger Games, but he decides not to dwell on the point. What matters is the here and now. That _he's_ the president, and unless Bonnie starts showing some signs of having children, there won't be a legacy of Rodney boys and girls to have him pass the torch along to.

"Legacy..." Calhoun says to himself, resting one hand on the nightstand.

Bonnie, who is readjusting herself in the mirror opposite him on the adjacent side of the room, looks back at her husband. She's dressed finely in a teal dress hugging her hips, going down to about mid-thigh, backless and giving a good view of her popping shoulder blades. "What, darling?"

"Legacy," he repeats, turning away from his own mirror. "That's what this Quarter Quell is going to be about. It'll define one lucky tribute's life... and it'll define our career."

She is not impressed however, raising an eyebrow, crossing her arms. "Seriously? That is what has you so uptight lately? You're thinking about what sort of legacy we're going to leave behind?" Bonnie rolls her eyes, going back to fix her earrings. "Honey, please stop thinking about your ego. Just for a second."

He does not know how she does it, Calhoun to Bonnie, referencing how when he looks at her, there's no deity in the world that cannot stop the blood flow from going south, and in the throes of passion, there's no deity in the universe that can break the spell she has him under. However, the moment real life returns to the fold, she'll stab him in places inaccessible to even the darkest corridors of his soul, twisting the blade this way and that until he is emptied. How can the prettiest woman in the world also be such a bitch?

"It might not mean a lot to you-"

"It isn't everything to me, you're right," Bonnie cuts him off, agreeing with his statement.

"But," and he bites down on his tongue as he says this, so hard in fact that Calhoun loses his train of thought, overwhelmed by a momentary lapse of pain. This 'but' is significant, as hardly ever does President Calhoun Rodney have to defend himself to his own flesh and blood, united by a stupid halcyon band. "It is a great concern to me. Please, respect it."

"I am respecting it."

"How so?"

"I'm still married to you," Bonnie says, smoothing out a crease in her platinum blonde hair, a strand removing itself from the perfection she had set upon herself. "Had I wanted to drop you in the middle of the ocean years ago, I would've," she turns to him, her gaze locking up with his, a spark of revival shocking Calhoun from the tip of his brain stem down to the tendon in his Achilles. "However, here I am, ten years later, still married to you, because I _love_ you."

"You have an odd way of showing it..." he murmurs.

"So does Hale Cornerstone and Arizona Merviere, but you don't see me getting into their business, now do you?" she continues, applying some blush to her cheeks.

He is going to pretend he didn't hear what she just said, as there's no way these victors, who secretly hate each other, are going to spawn friendships and relationships around without him noticing. Calhoun actually leaves the Capitol, unlike his wife who stays on the back patio of the mansion drinking mint juleps or is in the Gamemaker Center alongside that batshit insane Lewlyn Davis designing mutts for the next set of Games.

Calhoun raises an eyebrow. _Speaking of..._

"Are you able to indulge in me for a second?" he asks, slightly out of the blue, looking past his wife in his own reflection, gauging for a reaction. "Anything you can tell me about the mutations we're using for the Quell?"

Not only is Bonnie Rodney the wife of the president, the most desirable man in all twelve districts and the Capitol - just ask any single man walking down the street, he'll be sticking his groin out when asked an opinion on Calhoun, the stunning angel from above - she is also the head designer for the Mutts that are placed into the Hunger Games, a position earned entirely by herself, not a single hint of nepotism sprinkled in the ordeal.

However, because of this, Bonnie keeps her mouth tightly sealed, no secrets released on the confidentiality of her work. Just because her husband is the most powerful man in Panem - or so he likes to think, but she keeps that entertaining thought to herself - does not mean he has access into the dark workings that happen behind closed doors. Talking so openly to someone else about the horrors of the arena she creates would have Bonnie stay awake all night, and she is not one to do that. Calhoun knows that Bonnie hates being unable to sleep, as that creates wrinkles in the forehead, or worrisome marks on the cheek bones, and dammit, Bonnie Rodney is immortal and having worry creases in her skin only diminishes that effort.

It is an estranged relationship, Calhoun and Bonnie have, with the Hunger Games. Not that they necessarily enjoy the job, Calhoun lesser so than his wife, but that is must be done. It is never on the to-do-list for the president when he wakes up in the morning to subsequently ruin people's lives every year. When he's elected, ousting the aged war veteran who crushed District 13 single handedly, Calhoun debates in front of the mirror for months on end if he should end the Hunger Games. He keeps them running, and likely they'll be left running till the end of Panem's existence, purely on principle.

Removing all moral equities to the side, the principle that the Hunger Games remain as a reminder to the Districts to not rebel is a foundation that the country itself sits on. A house with a weak foundation, such as being built on sand slovenly like, will indeed wash away with the tide that rolls in every dusk and dawn. Panem works, now, and has for the last hundred years, because of the Hunger Games. To remove them is like taking a cancer patient off of life support, and surely then they'll die, and so will this magnanimous country. Calhoun is not going to be the one responsible for this.

Calhoun knows his wife is the opposite. She is fascinated with genetics, engineering, robotics... all that what-have you in the creative field excluding the media forms of the inspiration. There's nothing better suited to her talents than designing freaks of nature and terrifying monsters that can kill a grown man simply by blinking. Though she often times will shy away from the carnage her creations cause, there's a fascination behind it. These mutts are her children in the arena coming alive, coming alive and doing God's good work, driving the stain off the flawless land ordained by the forefathers that built the mantle in which Panem rests on.

In response to Calhoun's question, she keeps her face taut back in a smirk. "You know the rules better than everyone else, darling, I can't give you any hints. Besides, the arena should help clue you in just a bit."

"Honestly, it doesn't."

Bonnie turns to her husband. "All I can say is that there's two in the arena."

"Only two?" Calhoun raises an eyebrow.

"It's a Quarter Quell. The Capitol doesn't want, especially in a Quell, to have every tribute outside of the bloodbath annihilated by mutts. They'll need human versus human interaction, which is what this will give to them."

"Do you like them?"

She closes her eyes, a small smile tugging at her lips. Yes, the morbidity freaks him out somewhat, but this is the love of his life that is concerned here. She can feel however she wants and he'll be okay with that. "Sort of. They're... different."

"Different in what way?" Calhoun finishes rebuttoning up his dress shirt and jacket, starting to tuck the clothing back underneath the waistband, hating the constricting feeling it leaves on his skin. He'd much rather view the Reapings in a more contained space, where he is not exposed to the populace of the Capitol, having to play dress up. He could watch the Reapings in shorts and flip-flops, but that's an unruly, lack of manner way to dress. He's grown up on manners, per tradition.

Tradition, tradition, _tradition._ God, Calhoun hates that word.

Bonnie struggles to put her heels on, grunting as she does this in frustration. "One is gentler than you'd expect... and the other is a mutt that no one has ever seen before," He goes to interrupt her, to beg for more details like the predictable little mortal that Calhoun is, but she sees past the glamour, past the façade, smirking at his stupidity, at this carelessness, at his lack of capability as a mere man while she is the queen and goddess which rules the sun and stars beyond. "And that is all I am going to say."

To describe the expression on Calhoun's face as anything less than pouting would be giving the emotion a disservice.

He straightens out the last minute details, walking over to his wife, grabbing her left hand.

"You ready now?"

"I think so," Bonnie keeps one hand resting against her hip. "I have some last minute looking overs to do with the mutts and Lewlyn wants me to also square away something for the arena, but other than that, I think I'll be able to join you."

Calhoun smirks to himself, kissing her on the cheek, holding back the reins. The makeup crew will be able to hide her own blemishes and bruises dotting her neck with ease, and his own makeup team will pull away the dredges of reckless abandon out of his eyes, lowering him to a more civilized, subdued realm of feeling. "I imagine that the tributes are going to be slaughtered by these mutts of yours?"

"Some will," Bonnie ganders the response.

He goes to the door, one hand eclipsing over the knob, but he pauses, looking back at his wife. "What was that verse in that book called? The religious text? About things being slaughtered?"

Bonnie crosses her arms, frowning. Quite a strange time and place for her husband to be promoting and questioning biblical material. "You mean the sheep led to slaughter?"

The resounding grin on his face is wicked enough to frighten Lucifer himself. "Exactly that. Your mutts will make these tributes sheep led to a slaughter, won't they?"

"I suppose you can say that."

He is satisfied by that answer - all men are satisfied by meek answers - and closes the door. Bonnie watches him go, keeping her tongue silent behind her teeth, until she looks at her reflection.

If only Calhoun knew how much he _is_ a sheep led to his own slaughter.

That everything he knows is a lie.

That Bonnie Rodney is simply a shadow on the wall.

* * *

 **Alrighty, chapter complete in under an hour! Awesome! I have three more Capitol / Victor chapters to get through, and then we will hopefully have a final set of tributes left. What did you think of Calhoun and Bonnie Rodney? I'd say Calhoun is one of my more down-to-Earth Panem presidents I've written, as I try to make multi-faceted characters, not just antagonists. Bonnie, on the other hand, is a bag of tricks and then some.**

 **I have a general question I'd like to ask you guys, which is, "Setting content aside, what do you guys actually think of the writing? My prose? My characters so far?" I'd be interested in what you have to say, and I hope you do say something should you review, as it'll help me dearly.**

 **I'll have Chapter #5: Dreaming Behind Shut Eyes out sometime later this week... where we'll meet another new character! The plot le thickens! Please continue submitting tributes if you haven't already, like if you only have one tribute in already, send me another, I'd definitely need them! Thank you all! Please review! Love you all! Have a good night! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	5. Dreaming Behind Shut Eyes (Prologue V)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #5: Dreaming Behind Shut Eyes, with yet again a new character! Last chapter we met the presidential power couple Calhoun and Bonnie Rodney, Calhoun being the president, and Bonnie who is the head designer of the mutts in the arena... but it appears our damsel is not such a damsel after all? Excited for this chapter, hope you guys are too. Enjoy Chapter #5: Dreaming Behind Shut Eyes.**

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 ** _Master of Ceremonies Pollux Aetos P.O.V_**

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There's something relaxing about sitting outside, with the wind in your hair, having no worries to life at all. At least, this is what Pollux Aetos believes, the Master of Ceremonies, the wonderful Head Interviewer for the tributes of the Hunger Games. So he finds himself, stretching lazily as he gets out of bed, wanting to go elsewhere other than the balcony of his suite. In a moment of brilliant inspiration, he decides to take a seat on someone else's balcony, martini in hand, suit on, hair combed neatly, smirking to himself. He just happens to be in the presence, trespassing moreso, of the most dangerous woman in Panem.

Pollux has always liked the spotlight, ever since he had been a young child. He remembers watching Caesar Flickerman parading around in those platinum suits, microphone in hand, eyebrows rising up to his receding hairline, looking _damn_ incredible. He aspires to be like that, somehow, someway, even if it is just him doing usual things like interviews of puppy pageants or reporting on victor news in the Districts. So... when best friend Calhoun Rodney who lived next door to him down in one of the less wealthy precincts, who happens to become president, approaches him with the job of Master of Ceremonies, he has to hold all of his energy down to resist jumping up and down and holding Calhoun's hands in his own.

So, nearly twenty years later he is using his talents to sit on the Head Gamemaker's balcony outside her bedroom and drink martinis. He doesn't care that what he's doing is liable to have Lewlyn absolutely lose her mind over him, to drive her hands down his face like cat claws scratching at the skin. He stirs the martini resting up against his elbow on the rink porcelain table he's sitting at, going to take a sip.

Footsteps sound behind him, and he smirks, lifting his head slightly. It looks as if the mother bird has sensed something is wrong with her nest.

He only does this because he likes adventure. Lewlyn Davis is likely enough to smile at him as well as kill him in a second flat, so always having his heart racing inside his chest helps immensely, supplying a boost of adrenaline that causes his eyes to go wide, his pulse to drum inside his neck at a mile a minute. Pollux clenches one hand into a fist down at his side, head cocked to the left somewhat so his right side is poking out in her direction.

This would be quite awkward if it is not the Head Gamemaker behind him.

"Pollux... what are you doing?" and there it is indeed, her slightly nasally tone reverberating out everywhere. Pollux likes to push her buttons when he can. He seems to be the only one in Panem who can partially stand the Head Gamemaker and her quite lunatic mind, but that is only because he can sense in the shadows someone far more insane than her. He looks at her, she having her arms crossed, that glare in her eyes enough to turn a cherub to stone.

"What does it look like I'm doing?" he gesticulates outwards, martini in hand, some liquid splashing out of it and onto the balcony. "I'm enjoying all this natural splendor," and then his gaze returns to his drink, eyes twinkling, his own gray eyes looking like quarters clinking on the sidewalk. "And the splendor in this glass," he puts the straw aside and lifts his glass to his lip to down the rest of the martini. The liquid burns in his throat as it goes down, scalding, erupting volcanic fire that is the elixir of freedom and life.

"Isn't it a bit early in the day for you to drink?" Lewlyn raises an eyebrow, still unmoving.

He smirks at her, though this might be because he can see the way the hair on her arms stands up, because he's getting at her in ways only he can. "And isn't it a bit late in the year for you to try and fix me?"

There's been plenty of people in Pollux's life that have tried to 'save' him or whatever they called it. He wipes them away with the dismissal wave of his hand, all the while holding onto the next person in his life that is eventually going to turn over a new leaf and try to do what their failed predecessor just tried days earlier. Somehow, in a twisted game of fate, arriving at his doorstep is Lewlyn, someone who more than likely has a few loose screws in his head. However, it could be worse... there could _be_ Bonnie has the person interested in him, but he doesn't swing that anymore.

It may or may not be due to a certain presidential spouse.

The person in the shadows may or may not be her as well.

His retort has Lewlyn exhale sharply, her eyes flaring up, and he can feel the heat exuding off of her in waves. This might be the best way to get a tan. Screw sunbathing, Pollux is going to stand in front of the Head Gamemaker and let her anger wash over him. He turns to her slightly, head cocked like a cat, eyes narrowed in, because all he's doing is waiting. He's on the precipice, teetering off the edge until she responds.

Lewlyn takes another deep breath, closing her eyes, and Pollux reads her mind. She's counting back from ten to one, clearly, to try and make sure there isn't a Master of Ceremonies who plummets to his death. She pinches the bridge of her nose. "Do you have any idea what time it is?"

He checks his watch. "Yeah. An hour until the reapings are over."

The Head Gamemaker frowns, crease lines appearing on her forehead, lines so deep that Pollux could plant a garden there if he wanted to. "So... why aren't you at your post? You're going to have to go and talk about the tributes and-"

"I know my job, Lewlyn," Pollux cuts in. "You don't have to preach at me."

"If you know your job, then why aren't you currently there?" her tone is solidified, cold, and it cuts him down to the bone.

A shiver runs through him. There's nothing better than those cold chills of excitement that bury in skin deep with prophylactic tendencies, a chill that'll slide into his ribcage, where rust breaths a recursive disease into the prison of bone. His skin will decompose and his life will apart, until it is twisted back together in a sinew of tar and feathers. He runs a hand through his electric blonde hair, iodine eyes appraising the Capitol skyline.

"Have faith in me, Head Gamemaker," he admonishes patronizingly, crossing his hands over his stomach, fingers linked with fingers over his lap. "I was just about to head there, and you talking to me is making me late."

"Bullshit."

"Bullshit indeed," Pollux smiles at her.

"I can't deal with you this early," Lewlyn sighs, throwing her hands up in the air.

It seems though that the charms of the balcony even manage to bury themselves into the clinically insane, as the Head Gamemaker finds herself, to Pollux's amusement, standing in front of the balcony ridge, arms resting on the stone, and even her hair blows in the wind too. It is relaxing; Pollux wants to know why people don't ever accept his invitations to trespass on Lewlyn's property and drink martinis while dodging the goddess of death.

Pollux's fingers grip the mini straw in the glass, digging it under the fingernail on his pinkie, the strange and wet feeling alluring to his nerves. "Besides, shouldn't you be with the president? Shouldn't you be with Calhoun?" It is still mind blowing to him that his best friend is president of the entire country, there couldn't be a better, more benevolent man to rule Panem.

Lewlyn locks her jaw, a sense of annoyance covering her entire demeanor. It is the worst known Capitol secret that the Head Gamemaker loathes Calhoun Rodney and his administration, even if she is a part of it. His lack of direction, ambivalence to the problems at hand, and his general lack of excitement about the Hunger Games infuriates the Gamemaker in ways Pollux is only himself probably able to explain.

"He's not at the interview station yet," she says, with heavy disdain. "I don't know where he is."

"Where do you think Calhoun's at?"

She scoffs, giving an airy laugh. "Actually, _I_ definitely know where he is. He's probably still in his room screwing his wife's brains out..." she places one hand underneath her chin. "Our country is falling apart by the hinges and he's in bed making love with that infertile whore..." Lewlyn snarls.

Pollux raises an eyebrow. He knows that Lewlyn does not see eye-to-eye with the Rodney power couple, but he surely does not know the levels of contempt that she's just displayed for the entire world to see. An awkward bough of silence passes between the two of them, the residues of Lewlyn's rage disintegrating into the air, fizzling out like the bubbles in the decadent liquid called soda that Pollux likes to drink when he's feeling particularly finnicky.

He runs a hand down his pant leg, drying off the last bits of condensation from the glass.

Changing the subject, he clears his throat, "How's Rennie doing?"

Lewlyn snaps her gaze at him, eyes softening somewhat. "What?" she asks. The moment her brother's name is even uttered, a spark of electricity fires off under her skin, synapses awaking in the dead of night, her eyes searching Pollux's face.

"How's your brother doing?"

"Fine, I guess," she stirs uncomfortably. "It's not like you can get an answer out of him..." she even smirks at her own joke, a seed of hatred flaring inside Pollux.

His nostrils flare themselves as he exhales out from his nose, sulfurous streams of ash coming out with them. He senses the danger lurking behind Lewlyn's eyes, the childish smile with chipped and battered teeth, the way she giddily claps to herself when something goes right in the Games... and how she screws over family members like it's nothing. It isn't _nothing,_ it is a serious game and he's falling criminal to it.

However, since he is ever the diplomat, Pollux inhales again, calming the rage in his bloodstream.

"Is he free tonight?"

Lewlyn furrows her eyebrows together, the wanted garden appearing once more. "He's an Avox, Pollux. He doesn't exactly have free time..."

"But can you let him be available tonight?"

The Head Gamemaker rights herself from the leaning position she had been in off of the ridge of the balcony, one hand resting on her hip, a mischievousness in her eyes. "Are you trying to ask my brother out on a date?"

Pollux blushes the same color as Rennie's hair, the man in context. He can't help it, wandering from one person to the other, looking for a soulmate that he can also sleep with. It is not that he wants Rennie in the lusting sense, but more that the poor guy just needs a companion and he - Pollux - is able to look beyond the fact he is ostracized in the Capitol, or that he cannot speak.

The blush does not fade away on Pollux's cheeks. "Yeah..."

Lewlyn shakes her head in dissent. "Not gonna happen."

That shocks him. Surely, despite the Head Gamemaker's faults, she'd be able to look beyond a sort of narcissism and at _least_ share her pets. "What? Why not?"

"Rennie is a traitor!" Lewlyn snaps. "My brother was about to forge a signature on a document and you want to ask him out? I-"

He sits up straighter than he has ever before, almost standing up in fact. Lewlyn's ignorance is perhaps her worst quality, and Pollux wants to slap it directly off of her face. "Your brother couldn't write! You know that! I know that! There was no forged signature," in fact, he makes his mind up, the Interviewer standing up and getting directly in the Gamemaker's face, alcohol still tainted on his breath. "You betrayed your brother because he was better than you at something, and even in your forties you couldn't live with not being the best."

Lewlyn's face is at an impasse, no emotion betraying herself to the truth. She shakes her head, locks of hair falling and bouncing on her back, but she keeps her grim smile plastered where everyone can see it. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Pollux shrugs. "I think you do."

The Head Gamemaker throws her hands up in surrender, turning to leave, not having another word to say. Lewlyn does indeed make it back inside, one foot crossed over the steps down onto the balcony, the other still stuck on the white stony surface, when she pauses. Pollux pauses himself, about to go back and continue digging the martini straw under his fingernail, but he hesitates, as he can see Lewlyn is in a stasis herself.

She turns around, still calm and collected, though he can see right through her as if she is some sort of laminate piece of plastic. "You know I don't usually care who you go out with, Pollux... but _my brother?_ Forget the fact he's an avox and cannot speak. Why Rennie?"

He wants to say back at her, _'Why do you choose Rennie as your partner?',_ but he's sure that'll cause him to get pushed off of the other side of the terrace and fall unceremoniously to his death. Not exactly high on his list of things he's looking forward to doing. Pollux crosses his arms over his chest. "I've always found him attractive. He's kind, kinder than you," Lewlyn is hard pressed to argue, she's done amazing things for the people of Panem, "And I know he just needs some happiness in his life."

"And you'd be the one to bring my brother happiness?"

"As if you do. You make his life a living hell."

Lewlyn presses her fingers up against her eyes, having shut them, as if she's trying to ward off a bright light that'll burn out her retinas. She then presses her lips into a thin smile, wry and full of metaphors and promises that do not mean anything other than surface level beauties. "You always are attracted to the strangest people..."

"Well, one's choice of companionship is a curious thing," Pollux says back, darting his eyes to hers, locking in contact, enough so that she jumps.

There's a pregnant pause on the air, Lewlyn's mouth pursing into an 'o', eyes narrowing. He can read her mind, Pollux Aetos is always able to do that. _Does he know? What's he hinting at?_ He'd like to guarantee, somehow - maybe during this year's Interviews he'll drop the bombshell - that he does. That Lewlyn's skeletons are hidden in the worst closet that has ever existed in human history. One's choice of companionship is indeed a peculiar choice. Lewlyn keeps herself recollected, however. "Most curious indeed, Mr. Aetos."

Referring to people by their last names in the Capitol is nothing less than giving the middle finger.

Pollux crosses his arms. "Do you need anything else from me, Head Gamemaker?"

"Just that you know, once the reapings proceed, you're going to be the one who'll announce the Quarter Quell twist. Calhoun wanted to keep it a secret."

He nods, complying with the order. "I can most certainly do that."

"And, as there's no better time to mention it," Lewlyn continues, face registering the fact she did indeed have a reason to speak to the Master of Ceremonies, "On the night of Interviews, Calhoun wants you to ask each tribute their opinion of the others. They can be as specific as they like."

Pollux frowns, not seeing the purpose in that. The Interviews are designed to be purposeful to the tribute, to get to know them via the audience's perspective. Not to turn into high school parties and cliques. However, if it comes from Calhoun, who has always been off-limits in being questioned - he is off limits, as well, from Pollux's greedy and lustful grasp; friends don't date friends - he must obey it. "Gotcha."

"Is that clear, Mr. Aetos?" Lewlyn's voice could cut the marble found in District 2.

"Loud and clear," he says dismissively, going back to his seat, paying her no mind. The Head Gamemaker has come and done what she needs to do, and he no longer has any use for her in his company. His message is delivered loud and clear, as audibly, Lewlyn growls in frustration before stalking off to elsewhere in the Capitol.

Pollux leans back in his chair, sitting at the porcelain table, closing his eyes. Lewlyn is just a stupid sheep being led down a dark and dangerous path, at the end of it being the Master of Ceremonies himself. A lamb to be slaughtered, offered to the gods above as a sacrifice, and feasted on by the grass in which the lamb has terrorized for years.

Underneath his closing of the outside world, Pollux pictures Rennie in his gaze, smiling when the avox comes to view.

Dreaming behind shut eyes, this man in his future very well might become his someday.

The 4th Quarter Quell draws tighter and nearer still...

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 **And there we are you guys, Chapter #5: Dreaming Behind Shut Eyes finished! And our new character, a Mr. Pollux Aetos, our Master of Ceremonies, and my goodness I love his character. I think, so far, this chapter is my favorite, and that's because I also made sure to design Lewlyn in a very special way... she's not just some crazed, lunatic Head Gamemaker. She's oh so much more.**

 **I have two more Capitol chapters planned, and then we're off to the races (although I might add one or two more just to ensure I get the amount of tributes that need) and oh boy, there's some things happening in those. Please review! I'd love to hear your thoughts on this chapter, and to extend the question, what was your favorite line of dialogue _or_ favorite line in general from the chapter, as I made sure to pack it full.**

 **I'll have Chapter #6: Prosperity is Golden, coming from the P.O.V of a character I'd never expect to write from, The Man Who is Forever Silent... any guesses to who this'll be? I hope you all have a very amazing Christmas, happy holidays, and thank you so much for reading! I love you guys so much! Have a great day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	6. Prosperity is Golden (Prologue VI)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #6: Prosperity is Golden, a twist on 'Silence is Golden'. I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas and are looking forward to the New Year just as much as I am, as my New Year involves me going away to college, and I am super excited about it ya'll. Last chapter we met our Master of Ceremonies, Pollux Aetos, who had quite a few words to lay down the law with our Head Gamemaker, Lewlyn. This chapter will feature a point of view I have never written from... so this'll be interesting. Hope ya'll enjoy Chapter #6: Prosperity is Golden.**

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 ** _The Being Who is Forever Silent_**

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Despite what the details of the room entail, the Gamemaker center has always been a form of technological beauty, in the way it is designed, how it operates, and even going as far to say _who_ operates it. When there's not much to say, and he's always truthful, he never has anything to say, he learns more about his companions - loose terminology here - than anything else.

Standing on the second level of the center, resting his arms up against the metal bar that stretches from one end to the other, is Rennie, the being who is forever silent, looking over the empty room, the gadgets and gizmos sitting content in their slumber, to be unmanned by anyone for another week minimum. Rennie has always wondered, but clearly never given the chance to ask, what happens if the Games are ever delayed... if training takes a bit longer than anticipated, or the president suffers a stroke, what'll happen? What'll happen to the tributes? To the arena? To the mutts?

For some odd reason, his sister lets him go early, but not before hugging him tight and kissing him so hard he is still shuddering from its implications. He should feel disgusted that his own sister sleeps with him, dangling death over his head like a carrot that can always be ripped away if he pleases her incorrectly. Rennie is slightly relieved to be out of her claws for the day, as he's in company of someone that is willing to protect him and fight the established order of the world.

Rennie hugs himself tight, a slight chill running through him, as he dons a white lab coat instead of the usual getup that his sister makes him wear on Reaping Day. Away from Lewlyn's claws... and away from her terrifying grin as she manically runs around her own office and her own house, all because she can. He shudders again, and every time he closes his eyes, be it to go to sleep or simply keeping his eyes shut, behind the veil of darkness is her face, always her face. The face that is twisted in happiness and terror as she holds the pincers that keep his tongue steady, all the while he is thrashing, fighting, screaming, pleading... it does no good. The blade slices through the appendage like water carves out stone, and the spewing of blood haunts him more than anything else about that moment.

While in recovery, given about two days or so to help remediate the pain and loss of his tongue, where he lays there in bed, mute, cold, unmoving, terrified for his life, she comes in. What makes everything so horrible about this moment is that Lewlyn does not come into apologize. She stands over him, hands on her hips, shaking her head back and forth at her brother, all the while saying, "You couldn't let me be ahead, could you?"

Apparently, if Rennie recalls correctly, the last thing he said to his sister, which in hindsight might've teetered the Head Gamemaker over the edge is the famous four letter f-word expletive, along with the gesture because she ruins once again another sibling bonding moment out having drinks, as several hours later in the dead of night, Peacekeepers are knocking his door down, scaring him half to death, arresting him for some heinous crime he knows he would never commit, and then there is his sister standing at the top of the Mansion's steps like the Grim Reaper, pincers in hand...

Forgery of some document? Rennie, to this day, cannot write, and even after losing his tongue, Lewlyn has not pushed - allowed is the better term to use - for his writing capabilities. Somehow, and he is mystified about it all, because every Capitol official or politician in a thousand miles of Lewlyn's company can smell the fecal bullshit on her like a skunk sprayed it to her skin, yet no one lifts a finger. Calhoun, the ever so righteous and mighty president of God, who _knows_ Rennie's deficiency in being literate like that, does not ride to his aid. He does not throw Lewlyn in prison, nor does he strip her off the title for Head Gamemaker... it feels as if she's rewarded and Rennie stands there helpless, dressed in his usual red Avox robes and pants, standing silent, watching this unfold. He believes to be close to the president, but when someone of that much power betrays him... he's not sure who to trust.

Hooked to one of the rings of the lab coat is a pad of some kind, a tablet that he can use to vocalize his thoughts and display them on a screen. Lewlyn has no idea about this device, but knows about his position, while he waits, as Rennie stands there patiently for his savior to come.

A noise of disruption, that sound being sliding glass doors opening, brings Rennie's attention away from the splendor that is the Gamemaker Center, to behind him. Stepping into the room, heels, dress and all, is Bonnie Rodney. He has always liked the alliterate sounds in her name, whenever he hears it, now losing the privilege of ever speaking again. He wishes he could rip out Lewlyn's tongue and make her then eat it. He remembers his own sister saying something like that about their father, in case the patriarch of the Davis family ever decided to lift his hand to his precious, _precious_ daughter.

Bonnie, the designer for all the mutts in the Hunger Games, shuffles on a lab coat of her own hanging up by the wall. Rennie is her own personal assistant on days when she requests his presence, away from Lewlyn's claws, which he greatly appreciates. She pulls her hair back into a ponytail, smiling at him.

"Good morning, Rennie. How are you?" she asks.

He removes the tablet from the ring on his coat, typing away at it. The device is hooked into the main control system, which displays his messages out on the digitalized screen in front of the Gamemaker tables. The screen is about a hundred inches or so, maybe a bit more, about five feet tall, and currently blank. As he types on the tablet, the screen begins to come to life, a slow whirring noise emitting from the back wall as it boots up.

 _Fine. Lewlyn did her usual._

Bonnie wrinkles her nose in disgust. "The usual? She tied you to the office chair and made you listen to her rant?" A nod from her assistant locks in her assumption. Her mouth twists into a sneer. "I'm going to skin your sister alive."

 _Get in line._

Rennie smirks after he finishes relaying his message, placing the tablet on the outer metal ring of the level they're standing on, the same place he had rested his hands before her arrival. He takes a good look at her, eyes starting to slightly gloss over. Rennie has always found her pretty, perhaps the most beautiful woman he has ever seen if he wants to go that far. With her platinum blonde hair, slim figure, the eye lashes that curve at just the right angle... sometimes he is partly happy to have lost the ability to speak, since he'd never be able to find the right words to describe Bonnie's beauty. Then, every time, which happens immediately as he thinks this, an error system overrides his current train of thought. Not only is he an Avox now, the lowest of the low, even lower than District 12 citizens, this is the president's wife he's lusting about.

Calhoun, as gentle as the man claims to be, would rip out Rennie's spine from his back without a second thought if he even caught wind of what he thinks. Rennie's arms get snatched by a sudden chill, and he holds them tight to his body, trying to keep warm. It is the middle of August and he is shivering as if he has the flu... although being around Lewlyn day in and day out, is a more general thing is body is used to.

Bonnie walks down to the lower level of the center, standing in front of the hub which has a digital overview of the arena. Rennie can stand there and stare at the creation for hours on end, only to have his mind in the darkest crevices curse him for being fascinated with such killing machines. These designs of the Gamemakers, as beautiful as they are - perhaps beautiful is a 'loose' word to use, and he grimaces at the thought - have been designed to kill, and it is something Rennie actually partakes in even though he rationalizes it to himself in his head that he isn't. He generally is used to bounce questions off of Bonnie's head and agree with any decision she makes. Bonnie is the one who delights in it. She is the one who squeals at the carnage as her children annihilate and devour unsuspecting tributes that do not bother to watch their backs... and yet everyone calls Calhoun the monster of the Rodney administrative trio. Lewlyn has her demons, which Rennie is clearly at the blunt end of, but then in steps the president's wife and his own sister pales in comparison to what the designer of Nature's Pandora can dream of.

Part of Rennie's attraction to the most illegal thing to exist in Panem has to be the fact she genuinely sees through his sister's fakery. Whenever the two happen to stumble into each other for conversations, which is an unlucky occurrence, Bonnie is unable to resist throwing jabs at the Head Gamemaker about loyalty to family, to never betray the ones you love, and all Lewlyn can do is smile. He's been standing there for several conversations before, overhearing the taunts and insults designed by compliments, as he waits dutifully with a pitcher of wine to fill their glasses when their throats itch. He's seen the way Lewlyn's eye twitches, when she wants to destroy something, by slashing Bonnie's throat with the rim of her glass.

No one else in the Capitol even tries to defend him, from what Rennie has heard and seen, and here is this shining woman, this _lovely, gorgeous_ woman who has offered him solace from his worst tormentor... how he is _not_ supposed to fall in love with her?

Bonnie rubs at her eyes, turning to Rennie. "Unless I just didn't get enough sleep last night, I am going blind. I can't find Creation A. Which sector was it in again?"

 _Sector 5._

The designer looks back at the hub, biting on the inside of her cheek. Rennie looks around her a bit by moving over, her face contorted to an expression that means she's formulating a decision. After a pause, she leans back, clasping her hands together. "That's too close to the Cornucopia... and we know the audience wants tributes to kill each other, not our creations. Can we move Creation A out of Sector 5 and into Sector 9?"

 _Certainly._

Rennie taps away at the tablet, enlarging the Creation A, slightly transfixed on her handiwork, the mutation shining back at him from its unmoving portrait, glimmering silver popping out from the screen. He clicks the 'Settings' tab, types a few random codes in, and the translation that she's requested has been acted upon. That simple. That easy.

Bonnie lifts her head up, ponytail bouncing against her neck, scoffing. "Calhoun and I almost got into a fight about these mutts earlier," and Rennie knows exactly what she's going to say next. "He wanted to know, as usual, what they were and I couldn't tell him. I knew he was angry with me..." she picks at a scab on her arm. "You could see it."

He is immediately on the tablet. _Well, I guess he needs to get over it._

"I suppose you're right," comes her reply, and Bonnie places her elbows underneath her chin, resting them on the hub. "He also mentioned that the Quell is about legacy, the legacy his name will leave behind should these Games be unsuccessful," she squirms some. "We can't have children and yet he's still concerned about what kind of legacy we are going to leave behind..." Bonnie looks back at Rennie, making him jump, as the movement is quite sudden, he wrapped up in what she says. Everything that comes out of her mouth is liquid velvet to him, honeysuckle that drips over his ears and replenishes his morale. "Am I a bad wife, Rennie? Am I failing my husband since we can't have kids?"

His eyes go wide, fingers firing away.

 _Of course not! That doesn't make you a bad wife! Why? Has he been saying that to you?_

She reads the message on the screen, looking down at her feet. "You're sweet, Rennie. And no, Calhoun has not been saying that to me," Bonnie turns back to the hub. "I'd divorce his ass if that was the case." Rennie knows what else she'd do too; she'd stab him right in the eye before leaving.

Rennie takes what she's saying and plays it over in his head. What sort of legacy is he going to leave behind? As far as he's aware, there isn't going to be one. Who in what world would want to sleep with an Avox? He's heard from a few people, passerby's mostly, that Pollux Aetos, the Master of Ceremonies, has been requesting Lewlyn to allow Rennie the night off to go on a date. He is somewhat flattered at hearing this, because he thinks Pollux is the marble Statue of David erected into human form, but he's never entertained the thought of being with a man... _perhaps._ Anyone is going to be better than his own freaking sister. Or- well, so Rennie thought.

He hates and loves his sister just like he hates and loves himself.

With that sort of legacy, the Davis name leaves behind an Avox with no wife, no children, no property, no political engagement, a maniac sister who is also childless and single... it seems as if Panem will no longer have the Capitol Davis family tree exist any more in about thirty years.

" _Good,_ " Rennie thinks to himself, his voice strange inside his own head, a noise that is foreign, other worldly. " _Our epidemic over this land will be gone forever once I cut out Lewlyn's heart._ " Perhaps it is best there's nothing left behind from his family once they're all gone. It is a thought that saddens him, actually, somewhat. He wants to have a legacy in the world, but with the current chess board out, that is not going to happen.

Bonnie turns around again, as if she cannot stop looking at her assistant, Rennie still jumping out of his skin, breaking him from his thoughts. She begins to climb up the steps, which array from the ends to meet back up at the top like a circle, she moving quite slowly as she speaks. "Rennie, thank you for saying I'm not a bad wife..." but the cadence in her voice, which is all of a sudden sounding far sweeter than he's ever heard it before makes Rennie stir uncomfortably. "Calhoun thinks we can just have sex and that'll make everything okay. I love him... but, I need more than that from the man who is supposed to be my husband," by this point she has gotten closer to him, almost standing right in front of him.

She takes his hands in hers, his scarred and split and bleeding from Lewlyn's torture, while hers is manicured, smooth, flawless; it is a level Rennie will never reach. His heart is beating a thousand beats at a time, his pulse starting to accelerate, pupils dilating. Is she...? He is out of breath, already, by the way she is approaching him, as if she can read his mind. He begins to sweat nervously, actually, trying to focus anywhere else that is not her face.

" _Do not focus on Bonnie!"_ his mind screams at him.

"When I think of what Lewlyn does to you at night, forcing you to be hers, it just..." Bonnie shakes her head, eyes shut, anger and heat wafting off of her body. She is so close to him, all Rennie can think about is her perfume and how it is clogging his senses. "It angers me beyond belief. You deserve to be with someone other than that monster, other than your _sister..._ " Her left hand falls, rising back up to press itself against his chest, to feel his heartbeat. She purses her lip. "Just once... you should get to feel human again."

She presses harder, heat beginning to flush to Rennie's chest, as well as his groin. He swallows heavily, Bonnie's eyes raking over the man in a quick 'one-two, one-two', fingers sliding up and curling inwards on his sternum. He lets out a shaky breath, hands rising up to her shoulders, his fingers grasping ever so to want to push upwards. What would one kiss hurt? What could go wrong?

 _Everything._

 _Everything can go wrong._

It seems as if Bonnie is going to say something, but she doesn't get the chance to, Rennie, with as much gentleness as he can, pushing her back a couple inches, her touch receding away from his, gone like a whisper that came from a ghost. A fleeting taste of cherry red wine on his lips, freedom in the form of Bonnie Rodney. Her face goes through several emotions as he does this, changing from surprise, sadness, to hurt, and to complacency.

He hopes, Rennie is pleading to a higher power that this is so, that the expression in his eyes, a mix of wanton want and desire coupled with fright, is enough to express the shaky territory they're on.

Rennie has his eyes downcast to the floor, frowning. He is no sheep, not some little lamb that Bonnie can tote around. He appreciates her help, he appreciates her company, he appreciates the saving grace from his sister... but what is it going to be worth if they start sleeping together and Calhoun kills him for taking his wife to bed?

He doesn't even bother to pick up the tablet off the floor where Bonnie places it when she takes his hands, turning on his heels and walking out of the Gamemaker Center as fast as he can. He is not going to let Bonnie turn him into a sheep led to slaughter by tormenting him this way, even if she means to do it as a favor. He sees her, sees her transparency… and if he wishes to prosper, to stay golden, he cannot stray away from the flock.

The look of devastation on Bonnie's face as Rennie stands behind the closing elevator doors, he already starting to discard his lab coat, is enough to cause his heart to fall down several stories.

A panic stricken thought hits him.

" _Oh god... what have I done?"_

All that glitters is not gold, he thinks bitterly.

He thinks bitterly.

He weeps.

* * *

 **I think, so far, out of the Capitol chapters, this one and #5 are my two favorites. I never thought I'd enjoy writing an Avox's point of view, but it has been entertaining for now. I started designing the subplot that'll involve Lance, Kevia, Lewlyn, Rennie, Hale, Arizona, Hector, Calhoun, Bonnie, and Pollux and my god it is turning into like a whole other book with the Hunger Games on top of it. You can thank LongingForRomeo's SYOT doing that to me.**

 **In which it reminds me, go check that story out, by LongingForRomeo, Tempestas the 189th Hunger Games. It's an SYOT, very far along into it now, but I have a tribute submitted and in the story named Jerry Kapper that I think you'll like, and the writing is phenomenal. Go give it some love!**

 **Back to the matter at hand, what did you all think of the chapter? I can already tell I am having too much fun with this. Please keep submitting tributes, we're getting close to a full section at hand, but I'd still love the diversity and variety. There's at least one more planned Capitol characters chapter before the start of the Games and the tributes to get to, that being #7: Opaque Hearts, Opaque Minds, which'll blow your mind if I haven't already. Please review! You know how much it'll mean to me, and I hope you all had an amazing Christmas! I love you all so much! Have a great day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	7. Opaque Hearts and Minds (Prologue VII)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with the last Capitol chapter before we start seeing all our tributes, Chapter #7: Opaque Hearts, Opaque Minds. At the bottom of the chapter, will be the tribute list, but make sure you read the chapter as well! The tribute list goes by district, boy tribute listed first, then girl tribute listed. The tribute names are in bold, and the tribute submitter is in italics, surrounded by brackets.**

 **I have so far really enjoyed writing Lance, Kevia, Lewlyn, Rennie, Hale, Arizona, Calhoun, Bonnie, and Pollux, so we're going to have nine characters for the Capitol storyline. Here we are with the prologue finale, Chapter #7: Opaque Hearts, Opaque Minds.**

* * *

 ** _Arizona Merviere: Victor of the 88th Hunger Games_**

* * *

Trains whistle by, scattered papers blowing in diverted wakes as gusts of wind take flight. Denizens mill around the train terminal, some talking to others about nonsensical things like hair color or what score their favorite intramural sports team made last night in a play-off game. People are standing, heads titled back, eyes searching time tables as this train or that train arrives on time, or perhaps not on time, they stamping their feet like impatient children. Sunlight is pouring in through the glass walls that are the designing force of the terminal, heat pooling in and around pools of halcyon light that pocket the corners.

In the middle of it all is Arizona Merviere, the victor of the 88th Hunger Games, arms holding out onto the sides of the chair he is currently nestled in, head titled back, letting the sunlight warm him up. This is his favorite spot in the entire city, incidentally, in this particular chair, head back, as sunlight is upon him. Having the chattering accompany the whistle of arriving or departing vehicles helps too, akin to white noise buzzing in ears from bees or flies. Arizona comes here to decompress, to wind down after a stressful moment in his life in the Capitol - which would be all the time - but more than that, he's on the next train out of the Capitol to District 10. Hale screaming at him in the middle of a crowded bar, her herself leaving as she makes that quite clear, is indication that there's nothing left in the gilded city to stay for, until the tributes come, and he wants to be out of Calhoun's hair as soon as possible.

Many of the trains that depart from the station are not going to just the Districts. The Capitol uses the system for the trains to take people all across the continental landmass; Arizona has seen the maps splayed on the wall of Calhoun's office, it's an old state named Arizona that is how the victor receives his namesake from times past... from _far_ in times past. From sea to shining sea these chrome plated and painted technological bullets take off, to see the sights, to administer tours, and to let the Capitol people be who they want to be.

It is somewhat jarring, Arizona has to agree with this, that it is indeed a waste that he is one of two people embarking for the train leaving to District 10. It'll be arriving just in time for the victor to greet his new tributes, his new sheep led to the slaughter, shake their hands, and hop right back on said train. He needs to be there, however, in some capacity. He's pretty sure Hector has exhausted all possible ways of communication trying to reach his brother, the poor lost soul who spends more time in the Capitol than he does anywhere else. Home, in a twisted way, is the Capitol and not District 10, not District 2 alongside his wife... it's in the place that parades other human beings like livestock and kills them for sport.

Sometimes Capitolites will make their way out to a district just to see the industry, Districts Four and Seven the most popular due to the sea, and that there isn't necessarily a call for forests or heavily wooded areas in the Capitol. The only other person embarking to the land of wide open plains and scrolling hills and freshwater lakes is a Peacekeeper recruit. Luckily for him, as Arizona extends his congratulations, District 10 is one of the more tame districts than being stuck in 12 ever since Katniss's victory, or the Career districts, as the Career tributes in the academy always want to see how far they can go before the demons in white lock the barrels of their guns on them. In District 10, life is as mellow as the cow that Arizona owns with all of his daily feeding habits.

Truth be told, and Arizona has never told anyone this, rest his soul, for Hale would surely kill him, he hates leaving the Capitol. This is why he's stayed for so long; he's been inside the paradisal prison for nearly two months now, returning to District 10 for the Victory Tour and to live with Hale for three months, but the rest of that time, this vocational year, it's spent in the Capitol. He has nothing strong to defend himself, he simply likes the atmosphere. He likes the people, who aren't _all_ forbidden freaks of nature. There's nothing pleasurable calling Arizona's name to stay, as he isn't stuck in his hotel room because he likes the prostitutes.

If he's seen the Promised Land, why would he continue going back to live in his slovenly built hut made by slaves? If he's drank water from the Holy Grail, why would he return to where he used to have to drink it out of his hands, the water coming from a well? If he's slept in sheets woven together by Arachne, why is Arizona Merviere to go back to sleeping underneath cotton sheets that prickle at his skin and make him bleed?

He holds all of this in his head, a concern he holds so strong he's sure it'll burst someday from keeping it in. Hale Cornerstone is a strong, remarkable, vivid woman who'd find his affinity towards the Capitol as treason and probably remove his head from his shoulders if given the opportunity.

Biting down on his tongue, trying to stem the tears, Arizona opens his eyes, sitting up straight.

He's thinking of her again, and he really doesn't want to be right now. Hale is mad at him, his wife is furious and angry and didn't notify him that her train left... and yet here he is mulling over what he should or should not have said. It is not the first time she's stormed angrily away from him in public, let alone doing that same course of action in the Capitol, but something about this one felt too... different, _too_ perturbing to not raise concern.

Arizona rubs his hands down his arms, getting a sudden chill. Hale will probably ignore him, at least for a day or two, and things will go back to the way they were before.

He remembers her, he young and foolish, she young and foolish, he celebrating on the Victory Tour, having the time of his life, she stuck in a strange time-loop of deja vu. How he brings a glass to his lips from across the party, she talking to another District 2 victor that Arizona does not remember the name of, and he walks over to her. They're met at this point, and he's seen her in action in the Games just a year prior, knowing the ninety-six ways she could kill him with the glass of brandy in his hands. They've already met, yet something builds the courage up inside him to reintroduce himself, shake her hand with a smile, and ask if he could get her another drink, hers seeming empty.

Next thing he knows the two have stumbled off into the Mayor's office, she wrapping her legs around his waist, he holding her up in his arms, the two bending backwards over the desk, the sounds of zippers being moved, and he wakes up on the floor in her bed, in her Village house, his team freaking out over where in the hell their victor could've gone. She kisses him a bit longer than what is called for when they say goodbye, and a few months later, when he sees her for the 89th Hunger Games, it is his bed that _she_ wakes up in, her other victor partner acting as mentor near about to knock down the doorframe to Floor Ten. Arizona recalls laughing, hands on his knees, at his two tributes, both stunned when she leaves, hair a mess, wearing two different high heels, and acting as if nothing is going wrong. That year, the District 2 tributes murdered both District 10 tributes at the bloodbath, and all Arizona is able to think about is the way Hale tasted on his lips, her skin flushed against his, and the way she made him see stars.

Twelve years later, two kids later, and now he's managed to piss her off once again... oh how the mighty fall.

Arizona looks to his left, staring up at the time table. His train is to be there any moment. He stands up from the chair, wanting to fall back into the meshing world of leather and velvet, but he needs to go and do the one duty required of him by the Capitol other than to stand there and look pretty. His fellow Peacekeeper friend - hardly a friend, but Arizona has never had trouble making companionships - joins him on his right side, but it'll be another five minutes or so until the train actually gets there. He rocks on his heels, now turning his head to the right, furrowing his eyebrows together.

The other man who'll be riding the train with him has a surprised, nearly caught off-guard sort of expression plastered on his features. Arizona keeps his brow furrowed, wanting to ask what is wrong, when...

"Mind if I join you?" a voice asks behind him.

Oh _shit._

Arizona's eyes bulge out of his head, he turning just slightly back in the direction of the voice, then tilting his head upwards to stare straight into President Calhoun Rodney's eyes, the man actually standing behind him in the flesh. Yes, he's seen the president before. Yes, he's shaken the man's hand. Yes, he is somewhat an acquaintance... but this is quite different. He's never been in a scenario that pits him mono e mono with the most powerful person of Panem in his life, _ever._

Arizona clears his throat. "Of course, sir! President Calhoun, I- I didn't expect you to-" Even amid his bumbling and stumbling around, the victor extends his hand for the president to shake, in which Calhoun does heartedly.

Ever so the diplomat.

Calhoun stands on the same level as the victor, the two behind the painted yellow white line so neither falls to their untimely death. His blonde hair and Arizona's dark hair are contrasts on the same wavelength as their social status, the latter more trash than treasure, and the former the richest reward a man can reap. "I see that you're going home."

"Trying to," Arizona laughs nervously.

"Hector contacted me just an hour ago, saying he couldn't find you, and was losing his mind. I hope you don't make your brother do that a lot."

"It's a sibling thing," the victor scratches at the beck of his neck. "He's an exaggerative guy."

The president scoffs some, the scoff more pleasing than it being scornful in any way. Calhoun clears his throat though, and that means a reprimand is coming. Arizona has never heard Calhoun say anything positive that follows the clearing of the throat. "May it be what it is, but you know the rules. You were supposed to be back in District 10 by yesterday evening."

"I do know the rules," Arizona nods his head lowly. He feels ashamed, heat burning at his cheeks, the skin surely turning a fluorescent hot pink. Here he is, a man who has conquered the arena and the horrors inside it getting lectured, in a crowded, public place, on the necessity of knowing and following the rules. He wishes a hole could just swallow him up right now. Dying in the arena might've been better. He sets his shoulders back. "Can't help myself though. I hate leaving."

Calhoun gives a small smile, perhaps out of pity, perhaps out of admiration, but Arizona isn't quite sure. "Well, I appreciate you saying that."

"How did you even find me? It's like a needle in a haystack..." The victor is not all that literate, but he's heard that expression a time or twenty.

The president is the one to rock back on his heels now, seemingly more childish than when Arizona did it just moments ago. "Well, according to timed sources and notification systems, only you and Hale Cornerstone were left in the Capitol. It looks like Hale left this morning, and so that leaves you as the last one standing," he turns his head to look around at the terminal, back at the man's favorite chair. "Besides, you've already told Bonnie and I that this is your favorite spot in the entire city."

Arizona really has no idea why it is, sitting in that chair, head back, trains whizzing by, sunlight pouring onto his face, but it is. Not even Hale's own apartment she has out in her name in the throngs of the city is his favorite spot. "I met Hale for breakfast and she's the one who reminded me what day it was. She left to make sure she'd be back in time." He lies straight through his teeth. He's the one who knows well in full what day it is, and what it means to Calhoun, but he doesn't care anymore. He knows that his wife is the one freaking out about it - after all, he witnesses her spit the crepe she's eating out all over the counter in which she's sat at - but it is not going to help anyone if he throws her under the bus. He is going to stay in the Capitol just to rock the boat and mess with tradition.

Calhoun grins, this time his smile enlarging to a genuine one. "I'm glad to know you're trying to keep tradition going; it means a lot to me."

" _I didn't do it for you, you narcissistic asshole,"_ Arizona thinks to himself, and then aloud, "I try."

The president stirs on the yellow line, looking off a bit to the right. "Listen, Arizona, there's another reason why I came out here to speak with you," and this immediately gets the victor's attention, he whipping his head back at Calhoun, trying to keep his face as stoic emotionally wise as he can, albeit it proving to be difficult. "Bonnie and I were talking this morning and she said something that kind of bothered me..." Arizona's heart starts to beat faster in his chest. "Are you married?"

Arizona has no idea why, exactly, he makes the ghastly facial expression that he does. "Sir, you cannot be suggesting what I think it is you're suggesting. Calhoun, you're married! Even if you weren't, I'm sorry, Mr. President, but I just don't swing that way and-"

Calhoun's own facial features lighten up immensely, he putting a hand on his stomach as he laughs gently. "Forgive my modesty, Arizona, I didn't mean it to you like that," and in a second flat, as if Arizona blinks he would've missed it, the president sobers up his happiness, face returning to stoicism. "I meant, are you married. Legitimately? You have a wife?"

Everything seems to come to a sudden stop, and he hopes and prays to some sentient being that there is not a bucket of sweat pouring down his face to give him away. His mind runs at a mile a minute. _They've found us out... they've found us about Hale and I. I'm gonna lose my wife, I'm gonna lose my children. Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit ohshitohshitohshitohshit…_

"Sir, I-"

However, the president continues overriding the next line of protest Arizona may utter, not entirely exactly sure what is he would even be able to say that'll be enough to cover his ass. "Bonnie said that you and Hale are married behind my back, but that'd be ridiculous. As, once again, you know the rules..."

Arizona knows these rules fully well and clear. With the Capitol, any marriage must be submitted in documentation not only to the district this wedding is to take place, but also to the Capitol for verification, Calhoun himself specifically wanting to look over the documents. After all, as Arizona has heard this to be the reasoning, these couples will have children and these children could become future tributes for the Games and the president only wants normal couples to have normal relationships. Should there be a marriage that is consummated or followed-through by a service without having been approved, Calhoun has all the authority should the discrepancy arise, to dissolve the union and take hold of everything in said union. To Arizona, that is the end of the world. Not only is he lawfully removed from his wife, they also lose their kids, the only semblance of humanity left in them, and then whatever punishment is left to be doled out.

This adds pressure to the pile as Calhoun has expressed since the first day of his administration that he does not want victors romancing other victors from different districts, like fraternizing with the enemy. The explanation behind that is wherein the union of two victors from separate areas of Panem could create unfounded alliances or bias, tipping the odds. Somehow, this is a rule, yet the forbiddance of Career Academies in Districts 1, 2, and 4 is allowed...

However, and it is the only thing Arizona has left in his head to not jump in front of the oncoming train, is that he and Hale have a failsafe.

"Yes, Calhoun, I am married, but not to Hale," Arizona says, quick on his feet. Indeed, in the library of marriage documentation inside Calhoun's office, does there exist a piece of paper legitimizing a marriage the victor is involved in. "A woman in District 10, named Hailey Corningstone. As a nickname, I call her ' _Hail_ ', like the weather phenomenon. I'm pretty sure Bonnie overheard me talking about my wife once and due to the similarity in nicknames and last name, misconstrued what I said." Arizona pulls words out of thin air as he says this, using things in English he's never seen before.

Calhoun registers this information, looking down somewhat, jaw extending outwards. "So..." he drawls on, after a preemptive pause, "It is simply a misunderstanding with Bonnie? You are not married to Hale Cornerstone, the District 2 victor?"

"No sir," Arizona shakes his head back and forth feverishly. "I'd never break the rules, sir."

The president's shoulders settle down, and the threat has passed. He looks a bit beyond Arizona, down the line. "Well, Arizona, it looks like your train has arrived. Once you get settled, I suggest turning on the closest monitor you can find. The Quarter Quell twist will be revealed via announcement from Pollux Aetos. I suggest you tune in to listen." He nods, once again, turning around on his heel and departing, not saying another word.

Arizona's eyes never leave Calhoun's back, watching the president wade between the crowds, and he only removes his gaze until his train pulls into the station, coming to a complete stop, hissing of the brakes and all. His heart doesn't stop beating at an insane rate until one foot has finally crossed the threshold of the interior walls, he immediately beelining to his cabin.

Closing the door, lying down, he fumbles for the nearest remote, turning on the television compacted into the farthest wall panel away from the bed he's laying on. It turns out that he seems to be catching the latter half of whatever broadcast Pollux Aetos has been instructed to give, as the clock in the corner of the screen reveals that it is much later than Arizona believes it to be, missing the program.

He's never liked Pollux.

He doesn't like _anyone_ in the Calhoun administration.

All Pollux Aetos is, as the Master of Ceremonies, is just another fake person in the way of Arizona's happiness. He turns up the volume with the remote, subtitles strangely not working.

"... and now, ladies and gentlemen, everyone across Panem, I have in my hand the Quarter Quell card for the 100th Hunger Games. I had been instructed by President Calhoun to leave this unread until this very moment, for reasons unspecified." Grasped in Pollux's ghostly white hand is a manila envelope with a lightly golden trim lacing the edges, frilled and quite beautiful.

All the water in Arizona's mouth dries out as Pollux pops off the halcyon seal, pulling out the piece of paper. The 25th Hunger Games, the districts voted for which tribute to send to the Games. The 50th had four people per district... the 75th had rumors about victors going into the arena again, but it turns out that sponsorships have been eliminated, and a few percentages of natural causes rise up by unprecedented rates... something the country is not happy about. What could this twist possibly be? He and Hale have stayed up to the wee hours of the morning lying awake, staring at ceiling plaster, wondering as well, but nothing comes from their brainstorming.

Pollux looks at the piece of paper, reciting off of it without a hitch. "For the 100th year of the Hunger Games, the 4th Quarter Quell, to ensure that the tributes in the arena do not lose hindsight that this is a competition they are trying to win, and that not everyone is your friend... on four specific nights, there will be held a vote. Within this vote, the tributes in the arena will vote for another tribute to have killed off. The tribute with the most votes at the end of the session will be dutifully eliminated..." and there seems to be more, but Arizona's ears overwhelm themselves with the sound of blood.

He can say he surely did not see _that_ coming.

These poor tributes, these sheep led to slaughter... with their opaque hearts and their opaque minds, voting on who to kill... it sounds perfect.

Almost too perfect.

The hour of the 4th Quarter Quell is here.

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Marcus Pharadane** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ] / **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Persephone Castor** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

District 3: **Deacon Fincher** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Rochelle Pascal** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Basion** [ _Submitted by santiago poncini20_ ] / **Maisey Rovneay** [ _Submitted by_ _Tiger outsider_ ]

District 5: **Edwin Bishop** [ _Submitted by IciclePower33_ ] / **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 6: **Corvus Raynott** [ _Submitted by LKiraApple_ ] / **Lowelle Sable** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon]_ / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 8: **Galiant Rushmohone** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ] / **Marina Penweather** [ _Submitted by ilvidis_ ]

District 9: **Blake Hanley** [ _Submitted by glittergirl20_ ] / **Marissa Herdier** [ _Submitted by_ _Reader Castellan_ ]

District 10: **Hero Slade** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ] / **Victoria Armstrong** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ] / **Alexandra Quinn** [ _Submitted by SparrowBirdEliza_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ] / **Gaia Whisp** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

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 **Alrighty, guys, that was Chapter #7: Opaque Hearts, Opaque Minds... and there's a lot to go over so don't go anywhere!**

 **Our Quarter Quell twist, something I have wanted to do for a long time, and something I've never seen an SYOT do before, is have the tributes in the arena vote for other tributes to be killed, a la Survivor but a bit more extreme. So, four specific nights in the arena, a vote will be held for the tributes left alive where they'll be a tribute's name down that they want killed. The tribute with the most votes, well... uh, dies. However, these votes are down PM or review, but I imagine it is a bit more non-biased, but I can cross that bridge when we get there, but more on the twist and its specifics later: this is just to get it out of the way. If you have any questions, PM me and I'll get them straightened out!**

 **Now, to the chapter at hand, there's our band of 24 tributes! These characters are all great and I cannot wait to get to write them... as herein comes my next twist. With all of the SYOTS I have tried before, this being my fifth that I have been attempting (they were 1: Death Under the Sky, 2: Fracture Between Two Hearts, 3: Vermillion Shorelines, 4: Scarlet, Steel, and Sunshine, and now 5: Sheep Led to Slaughter), I burn out in the reaping phase from a many reasons, as well as lack of submitter response, which is very crucial for a story with a twist like the one this contains. So, to help remediate this... there will be a different system to how I introduce the tributes to you, but this is the only way for me to push through the block I get when I want to quit. Again, PM me if you have any questions.**

 **Submitters, I'll say it here again, that reviews are appreciated. I'll be honest, I love me a good review that shows you care, because none of these tributes here were bloodbath characters and are all multi-faceted, beautiful creations.**

 **For my reaping chapters, like I did in the past, I always write the procession out of order, as I hate being monotonous. I use a Random Number Generator, through the power of RNG, to make my decision. So... doing it now, we'll be meeting the tributes, ironically, from District 12 first (usually they're dead last), with the next chapter.**

 **But, this was the ending prologue chapter, and we're gonna have an ensemble Capitol character cast of Calhoun, Bonnie, Lewlyn, Hale, Arizona, Pollux, Rennie, Lance, and Kevia, which I am super excited about. Who was your favorite character for the prologue chapters, and who was your least favorite (besides Lewlyn, because let's be honest, you all HATE her). If you guys are excited for this SYOT, please leave a review and let me know what you think, and be sure to hype the rest up as well.**

 **I will be having Chapter #8, our first introductory tribute chapter, Beneath the Black, out no later than the 2nd week of January, so keep your inboxes open, your time available, and eyes peeled for the update! This SYOT is going to be awesome, and from the bottom of my heart, thank you so much for deciding to be a part of it. I love you all so much! Have a great day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	8. Beneath the Black (Intros I)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, and let me just say that this story is going to be a monstrosity, chapter wise, I'm talking upwards of 40ish, maybe even 50ish chapters. This might be me being overzealous, and I'll probably be chopping away at the plot, but I got carried away. Anyways, here with Chapter #8: Beneath the Black, and this time I got something to admit.**

 **I always lose my SYOTS in the reaping phase... and right now I'll be outright, I am not writing reaping chapters, but rather starting straight onto the train rides. While this does turn the apple cart over a bit, I want to actually write an SYOT and not get stuck on the little things. We're gonna meet twelve of these tributes throughout the next four chapters about the train rides, and I promise you'll love these guys. Enjoy Chapter #8: Beneath the Black.**

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 ** _Colt Sheppard: District 12 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

This cannot be happening. This _cannot_ be happening.

He has to tell himself this, eyes staying peeled to the outside as it blurs by him at lightning fast speeds. Eighteen year-old Colt Sheppard, hands at his sides, blocks out whatever noises or distractions are happening on his left. All he hears in his head is static, static and more static. Today is a beautiful day, and now it is ruined at the hands of god knows what other worldly powers that are playing a trick on him. Being reaped for the Hunger Games? Colt cannot think of another trick that is any more vicious or vile.

There's talk in the district amongst other boys his age, eighteen and a bit younger, that he should volunteer, given his stature and size, given that he works in the mines now and is able to break rock with a pickaxe, but he looks at those peers of his with a strange look that keeps the whispers down. He's no Career. He hasn't been trained for years and years on how to kill humans. He isn't a hunter like it had been revealed about Katniss's past, and just like her, he has a family to protect. Why on Earth would he volunteer for the games?

It is telltale though, that he _should've,_ because either way, now that when he gets to the Capitol the Careers are going to look at him and immediately want him on their side, even to turn on him in the end. Colt is very tall; usually most eighteen year-old boys in District 12 or all across Panem have height to them, but Colt _is_ tall. He's been hearing from family members and parents of close friends for years that eventually the pickaxe wielding boy would become the tallest person in the district, which is starting on the right track. Due to this height, and the fact he now is working the mines for a bit over ten months, he's starting to bulk, there's also muscle underneath his form and that gives off quite the appearance physically at how imposing he is.

Sunlight gleams off of his lustrous, dark skin, his own the suave tone of melting chocolate, the heat warming his skin. Looking at his reflection through the mirror, his eyes and hair match the same colors, his hair curling off like hayward lightning bolts that have no true sense of direction. He's an outsider for District 12, belonging more in District 10 or 11, but he finds himself with his mother in District 12, mining coal, scaring everyone, and deluding himself into the fact he _should_ volunteer for the Hunger Games.

The morning starts out like normal, the way it always does, Colt lying in bed as the rooster crow wakes him up. His mother, Caprine, is standing over in the corner of their run-down kitchen, which is nothing more than a few shambled cabinets and a long wooden plank, hand out to smack something, a fly perhaps. She asks him to come over and get rid of the disturbance so she can make breakfast, and strangely enough it takes a lot of willpower for him to _actually_ do it. Colt Sheppard is a gentle giant in all things considered. From his Career-esque stature, to his intimidating bulk, to even how his own demeanor can come across as... he couldn't even bring himself to hurt a fly.

He steals a glance over at his district partner, this frail, tiny girl, and he immediately feels saddened. This girl, which he doesn't quite remember her name just yet, but who does not seem up to be in the talking sort of mood just quite yet, is someone who doesn't deserve to be here. She's thirteen... maybe twelve, and all Colt can think about is how she's a goner, a word he doesn't want to keep on repeating in his head. He shudders at the thought, about watching something cleave this girl in two, where her blood shines on the grass...

Colt is so disturbed he has to press a hand against his mouth as if he is going to retch. His district partner looks over at him, eyes as wide as saucers, her face twisting in its own rapport of disgust and humiliation and fear, in which all the hair on his arms stands up. She takes one last look at him, at the man who if even exerts one tenth of his body strength, could snap her like a twig, and she runs off out of the dining car, leaving Colt to try and keep the vomit down, to keep the screams down, to keep the panic down.

If there is anything he is more averse to, it'd be violence. He's never understood the concept of fighting out your differences, and a victor resulting in the fact that the argument has been won. Showing off ego is one thing, that's being plain cocky, but using your ego to help win a fight to help win an argument is something Colt finds pathetic. Yes, he understands the situation irony as he says this, that here he is on a Capitol train to the Hunger Games where he is going to have to fight to survive. There will be blood… there will be pain... there will be suffering, and he is going to have to go through it all if he wants to live.

His mother's rough hands as he kisses her goodbye back home in the Justice Building is a feeling that'll never go away. They are the hands of a woman who has labored day in and day out. She looks him straight in the eyes, dark mahogany matching dark mahogany, lips pressed thinly into a tight smile. " _Fight only if you have to. Talk everything out if you need to. Beat the Gamemakers if you must..._ " That is her parting advice, and Colt, even hours later, can feel the scratchiness of her palm to his cheek, fingers plaiting into flesh and dragging down with him the secrets of the world.

Colt brings his knees to his chest, not wanting to move from his location. He has about thirteen or so slips in the Reaping jar, and he knows there are children and teenagers younger than him or the same age with far worse astronomical odds. Apparently, the guy he is standing right next to, eighteen, of course, has sixty-eight slips of paper in the jar and his worst nightmare just got saved by the guy who is aside him. Colt recalls how the other boy, a guy he didn't necessarily know all too well, cannot even look him in the eyes when Colt steps out as gracefully as someone who's been given the warrant for their execution can. He climbs the steps up onto the main stage, wind whistling in his ears, everyone watching him, but he keeps his head still, head stoic. His mother is already going through an existential life crisis now, with no husband, no parents, no other children except her baby colt... her baby Colt, who is nothing more than a little poor lamb, and if he even decides to look around for her, that'll be the moment he breaks down in tears. He does not have the time to afford this.

He is breathing through his nose, trying to stay calm and collected, as opening his mouth means he'll start hyperventilating, and hyperventilating is not the way he wants to go. There's a definite strategy here... and he knows what it is. It is no unknown secret that the tributes train in the Capitol with dummies, never fighting each other physically until the moment the gong rings and the bloodbath begins... so who is to say that Colt doesn't learn how to use a weapon? Who is to say that he doesn't make a show of himself and his strength to get the Careers terrified enough? Who is to say he stays silent, as silence means he's watching everyone's every move...?

Colt has to give himself some credit, followed by a slight laugh while sitting in the dining car. Hell, he thinks he just found his winning strategy and the games haven't even begun.

* * *

 _ **Maisey Rovneay: District 4 Female P.O.V (17)**_

* * *

"This is going to be so much fun!" she exclaims, literally bouncing up and down in her seat as the outside world whistles by. Seventeen-year-old Maisey Rovneay is not able to keep quiet about how much fun the adventure they are about to go on is going to end up, with her winning, with the world bowing and applauding, and at the fact that she is willing to do whatever it takes to get there. Her district partner, a guy named Carrion - she thinks that's just one of the stupidest names in the damn world - looks at her a bit weirdly, though their shared history makes thinks a bit easier to swallow, he has never quite seen her on full display like the way she is right now. She is up and at em as if she is some sort of herder corralling up cows, or thinks it is just another fun day in the sun.

She cannot exactly remember what has fostered this happy go lucky sort of spirit, where she is able to sit there and smile and not care if the world is ending, but she does know that facing death optimistically means the journey is ten times easier than if she is fighting and screaming the Grim Reaper the whole way down the avenue. Ever since she had been a little girl, Maisey remembers running around the district, hiding under fishing boats, leaping into the ocean, and rightfully so scaring her parents half to death, that she longs for the sense of adventure, for the thirst and entertainment of it all that comes with going on one. And now, at the age of seventeen, she's given her big shot, her big moment... she is going to volunteer for a Quarter Quell, for the 100th Hunger Games, and if that is not the biggest adventure anyone can come back from, she doesn't quite know what else in the world there is to do except visit the stars.

It is why, when some other girl, some bratty eighteen year-old with puke inducing blonde highlighted hair volunteers for the forgettable reaped child, Maisey pounds the ground with her feet, scaring other girls her age, leaping out of the section for her and running to the stage. She pushes the other nitwit down, perhaps breaking her nose from how hard she pushes her, and says... well, _screams,_ " _I volunteer as tribute!_ "

Technically, rules stated, she's already on stage, running upwards with the power of a cheetah behind her, and now it looks like any other lady who wants their big time to shine in a Quarter Quell is going to have to wait... for another twenty-five years! She is cackling in her seat at this thought, although on the exterior it looks as if she is laughing about literally nothing. Carrion jumps out of his skin at the weirdness, nodding low at the escort sitting with them, again some other git woman that Maisey finds completely irrelevant in her adventure, and makes haste for his room. He is probably going to need to spend another four days by himself in solitude rather than listen to Mrs. Sunshine over here.

Maisey stomps her foot back at the Reaping not just because this other girl who has way worse blonde hair than she does - at least Maisey can claim hers to be all natural - manages to volunteer first, it is because she's been cheated already by the Career Academy for District 4 two years in a row prior to this, and is not going to allow someone with the brain of a gnat, as she has the brain of an ox naturally, to steal the credit, glory, or her adventure. Back when she's fifteen, in the Academy, old enough to start showing off some skill with perhaps being eligible for volunteering, she decides to take a different approach to things. Most Careers, and the victors included, are weapon orientated, learning how to skewer someone eighty-six different ways with a spear or trident, how to cut the tendons off of the bones of a dead enemy Career... and she knows she's above all of that.

She, in what is perhaps a stroke of brilliance by some, a stroke of mad insanity by others, focuses on the other lateral aspect of survival in the Hunger Games. She runs the entire beachfront every day for two years straight, building up her endurance, building up her stamina, and making sure that her heart is in tip top shape. Some of the other Academy trainees find this to be stupid, as if Maisey is going to be in the Games, she needs to learn how to use a weapon, which seems to be an option so far removed from the girl's head that it might not even be there in the first place.

After her cardiovascular training reaches an all time high, she takes the time to start practicing tree climbing. Although there's mostly palm trees in the district, and Maisey knows just by looking at them that they are perhaps not the best sort of tree to practice on, she finds a beautiful ash tree over in the corner of the Victors Village that she uses. To be fair, the tree is on the other side of the metal gate so it is not as if she is trespassing... Maisey isn't _that_ stupid, she's just totally, one hundred percent out of touch with the world and how it operates. For another four months, every day, for an hour a day, she goes to that tree, which is a good thirty to forty feet in the air, and she climbs, _climbs, climbs_ that ash tree until her arms are more exhausted than her legs, pushing herself farther than she's been before. Once again, however, no practical weapon training.

The last aspect she focuses on, which seems to maybe be the better of the three, is her swimming. There's a pool in the Academy, fresh water, and then the damn ocean, salt water, that helps keep her aquatic upbringing actually come into play, but she spends less time on that than running the beach or climbing trees, not once picking up a weapon.

The being cheated part happens when she's sixteen, the second year of when the trainers are starting to look at her a bit favorably. She swims her heart out in the pool against fifty other girls for the title of female volunteer, only to fall in second because she never bothers learning how to properly throw a dagger. She hits bullseye, something that must be beginners luck, but her form is all incorrect and the girl that becomes the female volunteer ends up killing herself accidentally by losing her balance on the pedestal, setting off the landmines. Maisey cannot help but smirk as the other trainee who beat her ends up being infamous in District 4 and the Careers' history because the girl is shit-faced drunk and cannot even see the two hands in front of her face.

This year, for the 100th, Maisey populates the plan in her head to become a victor, but does not enter herself into the Academy competition to become the volunteer as that'll be just plain silly, she's going to be docked by the same group again for the same shitty mistakes. There's nothing in any man-made or self imagined rule book about saying that non-Academic trainees can't volunteer for the Games despite not winning the competition, and there is nothing in any rule book in the world that says she is not allowed to volunteer as well.

The running pays off, the cardiovascular training pays off, as Maisey exerts speed faster than perhaps any human alive to make it to the stage, her body so well conditioned that when she pushes the other girl, she falls to hard on the ground to break her nose... and Maisey does not break a sweat as she does this, grinning all the while.

She smiles to herself, heart pounding in her chest. This adventure is going to be a wild, _wild_ ride and she's going to win. Just because she may only see the world in one bright, beautiful color does not mean she cannot see an enemy for an enemy, and a foe for a foe... and a golden opportunity beneath all the black to become victor.

It is time for Maisey Rovneay to get her dues.

* * *

 ** _Hero Slade: District 10 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

Today might not be the best day Hero has ever lived, but he's able to cope with that. All that matters is that he is here now in the endgame with his lovely district partner by his side. He looks over at her, blue eyes locking with an azure expanse of the sky at _her,_ Victoria Armstrong someone in his life that he can say he's been very blessed to know. There's only one reason why Hero is currently sitting on this Capitol train to the Games, and that is because his best friend, his sister - he likes to think they're siblings on their own accord - volunteers herself for the Games, and there is no way he is letting her stay on this sinking ship by herself, so he volunteers right up after her.

It is almost unheard of, having two volunteers from the same district, an outer district too... it is a feat that hasn't been in seen in who knows how long. Hero, with his short stature, as he's only 5'2, compared to Victoria being an inch taller, something she dangles over his head like a carrot before she snatches it away is just another example of the cruel and unjust society he lives in... that she's taller than him despite being the same age.

When he's nine, he asks Victoria to go down with him to the lake over by where some of the cattle drink. The two of them have lived next door to each other ever since he's born, and she's only a few days apart from him, so it almost feels as if they are twins. One thing leads to another as the two are picking up daisies on the lake's edge when he says something a bit ruder than normal, a bit louder than he usually does, and she tackles him to the ground. As the two are wrestling, in which she surprisingly is showing much more strength than he expects from her, she has him pinned on the soil, in the grass, lips so close away from each other's.

Yes, Hero is nine at this moment in time. Yes, he is only fifteen _now,_ on the Capitol train, but when he looks up at her, at Victoria, with her mousy brown hair, and gleaming smile, and eyes twinkling like the stars above, Hero is in love... even forgetting for a brief second that she is pinning him down and beat him in a fight. It seems as if it is the start of their good luck, their astronomical luck together.

Breaking off from his stream of thought, in which Victoria has yet to say something as well, he looks over at the two victors on the train with them, brothers Arizona and Hector Merviere. Hero is fascinated, from the moment he started to conceptualize and understand the Hunger Games, that there are two brothers who have both been reaped, eleven years apart, thirteen years apart in age, and they both win... that future becomes idealized in his mind. On that bank on the lake, it turns out that the cattle on the other side is owned by Hector, he starting a small group of animals to foster and take care of as a side duty for the Games, that he witnesses these two young nine year-old's duke it out wrestling style.

He hobbles his way over to them, needing a cane to get there as the woes of the arena are not lost on him, asking what is up with the two of them and how they're so far from home. Victoria looks at Hero and Hero looks at Victoria, eyes shining something mischievous, where their answer of, " _Nothing sir, just training,_ " sparks an interest in the victor of the 77th Hunger Games that perhaps it might not be too bad of an idea to train Hero and Victoria on becoming Career-esque tributes... and the two take to the idea like hotcakes.

It starts simple, the both of them ten now, working with knives on cutting rope and running up and down the hill by the lake, as Hector is childless, and the man can see something, see _something_ in the both of them that he takes akin to, takes refuge in. Victoria shows a bit more promise than Hero on the stamina scale, but by the time it takes to using weapons, physical weapons, all bets are off. Hero loves the way a sword feels in hand, the cold hilt pressed into his bare skin, and he is swinging the sword with all his damn might at the base of the tree, exhausting his arm capabilities at a rate which means he's been putting too much work into it, this time Hero is twelve, and a switch goes off inside his head.

This could be something he could pursue... actually be a tribute, _actually_ winning.

He can thank that day, out in the blistering heat, where his own fingers begin to blister and erupt and scald rage over his skin as he grips that sword, that the competitive nature overcomes him. He wants to be able to slice through the tree, he wants to be able to make that jump from one tree branch to the other, he _wants_ to beat Victoria in the race down to the lake to meet Hector, and it builds that drive in him, it builds that want to win, that want to be... to be the hero of the family.

Hero has heard multiple times at the kitchen table with his parents how they wanted a victor... how they wanted a victor in this house, among four children, Hero being the third oldest of the four Slade children in the house, his own twin sister a minute younger than him. It does not do anything to help him here, as Victoria says...

" _When we're eighteen, we should volunteer together. We should volunteer for the 103rd Hunger Games, Hero. We're being trained by a victor already, and it means we could totally win. You know how Katniss and Peeta won the 74th together? We could totally emulate_ that!"

This is the second switch that flips off in his brain. Victoria wants to be like Katniss and Peeta... but in what way? Now he's able to stand there, watching as she fights with Hector who is doing his best not to fall over, he sees the way her chest is starting to expand, how her body begins to fill out and how even there, there's a strange sense of apprehension in the air when his own voice drops, his limbs elongate, he can eat a whole herd of oxen... and his own pants tighten, that he is in love with her, but is she in love with him?

If Victoria wants to become Katniss and Peeta for District 10, twenty-six years later in the future, how far is she willing to go? How far is _he_ willing to go?

" _As far as it takes,_ " Hero thinks to himself, and then in the moment, he reaches over a presses a hand up against Victoria's.

She looks up at him, perhaps wrapped around in her own thoughts, smiling at the warm touch. His heart flutters underneath his skin, drumming, drumming, _drumming_ and dammit, Victoria is beautiful.

"You okay?" he asks her. The apple cart is rocked and turned over, as now they're no longer eighteen, they're never going to be eighteen. One will have to win at fifteen years old, save the other, and become the star-crossed lovers of a different district with a different president when no hints of rebellion are rising through the ranks.

Victoria looks away for a second, abashed. "Yeah, Hero, I'm fine."

He leans in a bit closer to her, hesitant, fingers curling in on the top of her hand ever so slightly, his neurons firing at a thousand miles per hour. "Hey, listen to me. We can do this. We've trained. We're best friends, we've got each other's backs. We _can do this,_ Victoria. We're going to win this Quarter Quell."

Now, a switch seems to flip off in hers, and she looks back up at him, aquamarine clashing with turquoise, and a confident smile placates itself on her face.

"We're going to win this, Hero. We _can_ win."

Hero grins back, wider than ever, his muscles starting to hurt, but there's something in his veins that cannot be replicated.

Pride. In himself. In Victoria.

This can totally happen.

This _will_ happen.

And nothing is going to get in Hero's way.

* * *

 **Alrighty everyone, Chapter #8: Beneath the Black, our first instance of this tributes, is here! I much rather like this new format than writing twelve reapings, as that gets monotonous. I really did enjoy writing this, and I hope you guys enjoyed it too! So, we've met Colt, Maisey, and Hero so far, and by extension, Carrion and Victoria; and there's plenty more tributes to see. I hope you guys review, it'd mean the world for me to know, and thank you all so much for the contribution. I shall see you all soon with Chapter #9, where we will meet another three tributes. I love you all! Have a great day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	9. Periodic Self-Destruction (Intros II)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with the next chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, our whimsically violent SYOT, #9: Periodic Self-Destruction. Last chapter was the first of four train ride chapters, done to help get past a reaping phase and jump straight into the games instead. The first three tributes we met were Colt Sheppard (D12 M), Maisey Rovneay (D4 F), and Hero Slade (D10 M), and we're about to meet another three from three completely different districts. Thank you guys for the reviews and the followings; shows me you care! Enjoy Chapter #9: Periodic Self-Destruction.**

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 ** _Annabellina Circuit: District 5 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

She can still feel the jolts of electricity running underneath her skin, similar to the jolt of perception, of realization, of terror, as the escort picks out her name from the large reaping jar. It looks like she's not getting any older...

" _Can we trust them? Can we trust him?"_

 _"Of course we can, Anna."_

 _"No! I want to fight them all! Kill them all!"_

 _"Abe, calm down, seriously, calm down."_

 _"Elli, you can't control everyone."_

 _"It doesn't matter, we're killing them all!"_

Ah... Annabellina bites down on the knuckle of her left pointer finger, bringing the skin deeper and deeper into her mouth. She wants to scream out loud, to tell Anna and Abe and Elli and Belle and Lina to all shut the hell up, but that won't work, she's too much caught up in her own head. Her skin still bristles with the energy of feeling alive, an aliveness that hits the heart and keeps it pumping. Just like how the aliveness in her soul with that wire, as the wire looks so pretty... and her father is nowhere around, as she might as well-

" _OWWW!"_

Annabellina jumps.

" _Abe, once again, calm down."_

 _"She pushed me! Lina pushed me," Abe freaks out, holding hair into hands and wishing to tear it out._

 _"You two, get a hold of yourself. We have to help Annabellina out."_

 _"You mean help her die?"_

 _"Lina... not the time," Anna steps in between them all, holding hands out._

Annabellina looks out the window, frowning. She's all alone on the train, her district partner falling asleep the moment they all stepped onto the train, and here she is lounging about while a war goes on inside her mind, unsure of what to do, unsure of what to say, and unsure of where to go.

" _We could try jumping off of the train, then..." Belle trails off._

 _"We are not doing that!" Anna snaps. "Suicide is not the answer. She can win this."_

 _"Yeah," Lina snorts. "And pigs fly."_

 _"We can win this," there's a strength surging in Abe's voice now. "We just have to snap all of their necks..."_

 _"Abe!" a slap sounding resonates. "We. Are. Not. Killing!"_

 _"Okay, then. I guess she's dying," Elli says nonchalantly._

Annabellina has her hair down for now, blonde locks resting against her shoulders, but for a split second her fingers hesitate, going to the back where her hair is, thinking about tying it upwards. Usually, for funerals, at least from what Anna tells her, people have their hair up underneath bonnets and hats and other sorts of articles of clothing when they're in mourning. She's in mourning, for goodness sake she's just been reaped to go to the Hunger Games, as if that isn't something else to be afraid of.

" _I think we should talk to the district partner. Get a strategy going..." Anna rubs her chin._

 _"Yeah... he's gorgeous. We should go talk to him!"_

 _"Belle, just because you show him your tits doesn't mean it is going to work."_

 _"Trash!"_

 _"Hypersexual bitch..."_

 _"Girls!" Anna and Elli jump in at this moment and time, forcing Belle and Lina apart. Abe is shouting in the background, 'fight, fight, fight', all the while pounding a fist._

Annabellina falls out of her chair, one hand on the ground at this point, the other going to her forehead, she taking a deep breath. In through her mouth, out through her nose. In through her mouth, out through her nose. She just wishes her father could be sitting in front of her right now, a hand on her shoulder as he coaches her through these breathing exercises. Everything is better when her dad is around, just like as her hair stands up on end, her hazel eyes seeing supernova clouds of all white, and the smell of burnt flesh.

She looks down at her hands. Annabellina does not recognize the hands that belong to her, as if they aren't hers anymore, scarred pockets of flesh with sinew tears that look like ink droplets of tar running down the front. It is time to be practical about this, as Anna is speaking to her through Elli, that maybe her hands were a transcendence from someone else and the reason she looks scarred is because her true form of beauty is so heavenly it'll incinerate someone on the spot.

She knows this isn't true, but a bit of fake imagination to help soothe and taint the bitterness of reality has never gone that wrong before. It is like a lozenge placed on her tongue as she has a sore throat... the actual medication is going to do nothing to help her get over the hump of fright that is how her reality is spinning down, or that bacteria is ripping her tongue and uvula and tonsils and the rest to pieces.

It helps, however. Every little bit helps.

Annabellina presses her hands to her forehead, the static starting to overwhelm her senses, a strange smell eroding from the carpet. It is an odd one, like raw eggs mixed in with hair, and it is near gagging. However, nothing is worse than standing in the August heat in that horrendous black dress - she's yet to change - only because Lina and Belle go back in forth between the dark one and the bright pink that shows off her chest in a rather revealing way... but leave it to Belle to be the slut. The escort with her prim hair and stupid stilettos and stockings and all of that just plain _stupidity_ dipping her lion paw into the bowl and calling out her name, five out of what... three thousand slips?

Belle screams and therefore Annabellina screams. Abe pushes Belle to the ground, and Annabellina runs straight to the stage in a non-panic sort of manner, rigid shoulders, set back, arms by her side and as she climbs the steps, Anna takes the podium. Annabellina stands there, as her district partner is reaped, no volunteers for her or for the boy coming alongside them, stoic, strategies running through her head, and then she catches sight of her father standing in the center of the sections, between the boys and girls, hand outstretched in her direction. She wants to go running to him, but a Peacekeeper forcefully grabs her father's hand - Anna no longer has control, it is Abe, it is Abe who is wanting to rip out the Peacekeeper's spine and make him eat it - as the demon in white is holding her dad a bit harder than she likes. Annabellina goes to leap off of the stage, to tackle the Peacekeeper, but her district partner holds her back, fighting her the whole way.

"Don't! You'll only make things worse!" her district partner shouts.

"That's my father!" Annabellina protests in frustration, by now the Peacekeeper hauling her father away towards the gathered parents and shoving him back into line. All that happens is that the grip is a bit too strong, he is not actually hurting her father in anyway, but it is on the principle alone that he had even touched him in the first place.

" _I want to disembowel him!"_

 _"Me too!"_

 _"Lina, Abe... violence is not the answer," Belle says suavely, running a hand up against Abe's shoulder._

 _"Belle is right," Anna squeezes her eyes shut. "I can't believe I am saying this, but she's right..."_

Annabellina goes limp in her district partner's hands, the fight expelling out of her and back into her veins. She wants to look upwards at her head and wonder why Abe cannot exist all the time, why can't _he_ sit at the control panel and let that happen, when she wants to bring the injustices of the world down around her. All Anna has to do is open some sort of book, bringing her back to ancient roots before the lazy afternoon, the copper and silver wire, and the crackling of energy across her flesh and she is calm once more.

She keeps to herself. The victors with them could try and coax a conversation out of her, but after Annabellina's moment of chaos on stage, it is best to let things die down and she lay low. Show the world and the Capitol that she isn't some damsel in distress, let Abe show what he can do...

All the voices overwhelm one another, one on top of the other, and then another swap and on and on it spins, a wheel brokered by trust and faith that five is a greater number than one, yet it turns out that the five are causing the one periodic self destruction. Annabellina holds a fist close to her chest, still siting and lying on the floor on the train car, resting her head back up against the seat.

" _We should let her sleep..." Elli looks down at her feet._

 _"I want to think of strategy," Anna protests._

 _"Yeah! Strategy! Where we kill everyone else..."_

 _"Abe..." Belle says threateningly. "Annabellina is exhausted. Let Elli have the wheel."_

 _"I'm just as exhausted as her," Lina yawns._

 _"Sweet dreams..." Elli whispers._

Annabellina has a smile cross across her face, eyes shut.

"Sweet dreams indeed..." she whispers.

* * *

 ** _Marcus Pharadane: District 1 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

Believe it or not, this is not the first time he has ever ridden a train to the Capitol. Once, a few years ago, as his brother is more curious in the Peacekeeper route, and due to begging his father, Marcus watches as his older brother Morris - idealistic in every way, tall, striking, handsome, getting everything he asks for - has a chance to meet Calhoun, but the president requests the Pharadane family all go to just see what could happen if Morris manages to become a Peacekeeper in the Capitol instead of just the districts which most recruits have happen.

Marcus remembers the president looking down at him, poor ole' Marcus at fifteen, 5'5, and the president asks what is his path.

"The Careers…" he replies, as earnestly as he can, but his words twist his heart in two and there's the sound of shattering glass. He does not want to be part of the Careers. He does not want to be in the Hunger Games. He does not want to do any of this yet he's here as is, sitting on the train going to the Capitol for a second time, and he might not come back. Morris is gone now, twenty years old and in the Capitol as a Peacekeeper, but there's probably a zero percent chance Marcus will get to see his brother.

He hates violence. Loathes the very notion to its core.

Yes, Marcus knows full and well how that makes quite no sense in a world for Panem, but there is this strange sense of duty falling onto his shoulders. Marcus Pharadane watches as his idol, his brother, who is on track to become the next District 1 victor at eighteen through the Academy, their golden child almost, give it all up to live in the Capitol and then it all squarely falls down on him, at fifteen, to pick up the mantle and take Morris's place. This wouldn't be an issue, truthfully, Marcus realizes, if he hadn't also been only 5'7, his body trying to fill out muscle wise while his stature fails him. He's a late bloomer, as initially he is not considering the Career Academy path, but moreso in the art of creating fine jewels, but not for the district. For him.

He sees it perfectly, where he has this dream house made entirely of quartz, a dream house with a chandelier of diamonds, a floor rubies, sapphires, and emeralds. His bed is sculptured marble, and he is sitting there in his materialistic world, spoiled as can be as the world is what he makes it, but still not lifting a finger to cause a single stroke of violence.

A hand slaps his face, jarring Marcus away from the vision of his perfect house. He glares at the person who slapped him, quickly dropping the attitude as it is not his mother or father or even his new district partner, but his victor mentor.

Lance Viel, victor of the 79th Hunger Games, lowers his head a bit, furrowing his eyebrows together curiously. The victor is dressed neatly in his suit and tie, resting up on his cane as the bite in his leg still causes a few tremors. "You need to stop spacing out, son."

Marcus views Lance to be his second father, even though Lance is making him work for everything that success can buy. He's always wanted to go the Hunger Games, as a young kid, like most District 1 kids and teenagers who are unable to recognize what happens, but then it comes to him a bit later watching his father butcher some poor squirrel for dinner that he just doesn't like violence. He loathes it, hates it with a bigger passion... yet he wants to join the Hunger Games. It just seems, with Morris taking up the helm to become the Career Academy victor for the Pharadane family that Marcus can lie back on a meadow of pearls - grass is terrible, nature is overrated anyways - and do nothing for the rest of his days.

Then his world goes for a spin and he has to change his ideology in a second.

Lance swoops up Marcus to be his next protegee, despite Marcus not really being a prodigy or efficient in any sort of way at any weapon, a switch is flipped inside his brain. In order to win at the Hunger Games, he has to learn how to fight, how to use a weapon, and how to use it _well._ Not only does that require time and energy, it requires practice, and said practice helmed by Lance, the man grooming him to become what Morris let go... it is indeed going to happen. Marcus has never been denied anything in his life, from simple toys, to fourths and fifths at dinner, to girls who really didn't want to spend their evening with him... what would becoming victor of the 4th Quarter Quell truly cost him?

He's never applied as much dedication to anything in his life as learning how to shoot a bow and arrow. Now he can do it as if it is second nature to him, breathing, eating, sleeping... he knows how to do that just as well as emptying a quiver into dummies. He's never aimed his weapons at a person... but it couldn't be _that_ much different, right? A shudder runs down his spine, his dark skin tightening and becoming tight, Marcus swallowing heavily. He's heard the stories from Lance, who no longer brags as much about his own kills, the way blood would coat his pale flesh and paint him like a bright neuron star. He has seen Game clips from limbs being severed, all the while Marcus runs to the trash can to upheave chunks of his latest meal. He wants to quit at times, Lance pushing him heavier and farther than he's ever gone before... but he can't stop now. Not after Morris fails the Pharadane family. Not after his father, Jason places a hand on his shoulder and says he's the last chance the Pharadane family has at true District 1 glory, to be etched into the Justice Building's memory.

There's no hope for them, Marcus thinks, when looking at his younger brother, Devon. The kid is skinny as a rail, despite being heading into his puberty years, and is not the sharpest tool in the shed. It is up to him. If Marcus wants to live in that home made entirely out of precious stones and gems, he needs to win the Hunger Games, he needs to put aside his affinity for non-violence, man up, and become who he is never born to become. Deep down Marcus knows it is not written in the stars, but admitting that would just be another slap and-

Lance snaps his fingers in front of Marcus's face. "Marcus, pay attention!"

He pulls himself away from the mind puzzle, blushing heavily. "Sorry, Lance. I was... I was just thinking."

This bemuses the victor, he resting one fist on his knee. "Thinking about what?"

Marcus licks his lips, his throat suddenly super dry. "I've only practiced archery at targets and dummies. Not..."

"Real people," Lance finishes for him. The victor pinches the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes. He is no way making enough money from this. "Listen, Marcus, we've been over this. In the arena, you are going to have to aim and shoot to kill other tributes. What are you going to do when it comes down between Valencia and another tribute aiming to kill her when she's occupied with something else? You going to let her die?" Marcus doesn't say anything, actually having to think about it. "You're killing that son of a bitch! Besides, do you think, save for a very few, that there's been a Hunger Games victor who hasn't killed anyone? Let alone a _Career?_ " Lance scoffs. "Marcus, let's say you and Valencia made it to the final two. It's happened before, it could happen this year. Let's say hypothetically you haven't killed a single tribute yet. You want to go home. Valencia wants to go home. Are you going to try and convince her to kill herself so you could be bloodless throughout the Games? That's impossible."

The District 1 male rolls his tongue up inside his closed jaw, absorbing Lance's words. What the victor is saying is absolutely right. He is going to have to kill someone eventually down the line if he wants to bring pride to the Pharadane family. He is going to have to more than likely kill Valencia, his district partner, to get back to District 1, betray the Careers... all of this will have to happen if he wants to win.

He tries settling a more confident grin on his face. "It could happen, right? With me being the best archer Panem has ever seen and-"

"Hold on there," Lance interrupts him. "I have never said that, neither has Kevia. You aren't the best archer to have ever lived, and none of the people in the Games before you have ever been either," the victor leans in. "Being confident is good. Being over arrogant in your abilities is hubris. A deadly sin. That'll get you killed."

Marcus's face distorts into that of confusion. "If I am not the best than what am I now?"

"Good enough."

"And I don't want to be good enough."

"Then get better," Lance enunciates each word of the sentence. "No one ever in the history of the Hunger Games has managed to become the perfect tribute. Something always kills them. And when you're at the top, there's only one way to go and that's-

"Down..." Marcus whispers, it dissipating like the breath from a phantom.

"Down. That's right."

Marcus tilts his head like a cat's, eyes shining a strange silver.

"Well, I guess that makes it simple then." A physical smile, one that is not forced, one that is not fake, comes out. "I guess I just have to be the first to reach perfection."

* * *

 ** _Peri Florence: District 7 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

The way her hair falls out makes her think of witling flowers that die in the winter time, as the leaves of the great big oak trees that line the District 7 horizon lose their own colors and soon become dry husks of their usual self. It is... pitiful.

"Don't think pitiful," she hisses to herself. "Pity is annoying. Pity is unwanted. Pity is desperation and stupid."

She places a hand to her mostly bald head, fingers desperately wanting to run through follicles of hair, to run at full speed again like she's used to, to no longer lie in a bed and have someone speak pity to her. Pity is overrated, exhaustive, deplorable, and yet it is the only emotion people seem to carry around with them as if they have nothing more to hold onto. Peri looks at herself in the reflection of the outer window, trying to get a good look past the sunlight and the tree line to stare back at dark brown eyes full of misery... eyes that used to be bright, but are more morose now, sullen and downtrodden, bleak, and unhappy. Where there used to be long blonde locks of Rapunzel-esque hair that used to run down to mid-back, whipping in the wind as she went on journeys throughout the districts, there are cold chills and winds that blow in the breeze.

It is why her hand shoots up to volunteer this year for some twelve year-old that is reaped. She knows nothing about the girl she is presumably sparing for another year or so, but it also to run down her own internal clock, as eternity is no longer waiting for Peri Florence to give up, it is waiting to stab her in the spine and kill her outright. What is wrong with wanting to take one last look at the beautiful and glorious world that is the Capitol before giving her final breath?

Occasionally she'll look away from the outside window to stare at her district partner, the boy, a guy named Linden, she thinks, who is looking down at his hands, fidgeting, not quite bringing his eyes to her at times, but he is always staring at her. Always. Peri figures it is because he's probably never seen an almost bald girl before, but she doesn't want to ask because she already knows.

However, she can admit that she's curious, Peri will allow that. Why is he looking at her with a fascination behind the stare? She searches his eyes, still saying nothing, no pity found in them, which raises her heart rate some. As if he is genuinely looking at her.

There is a world out there for her to see and she is not going to sit there and lie in bed while she rots, as the leaves change color and die too, withering away from the winter chill. Her own winter chill is inside her body, as her parents hold her frail shoulders, as her already wispy and thin frame loses another sixth of her usual body weight, becoming the District 7 freak, but Peri doesn't mind. She is enjoying the last bit of life she is able to hold on to, with the energy that she has.

She even jogs up to the District 7 Justice Building stage alongside the escort and the victors to claim her spot, everyone's eyes on her, bewildered, bewildered even more than ever before, as clearly she is no Johanna in the making, but she's enough... an inspiration to someone out there. Perhaps to the boy on her right? Peri looks back at him, raising an eyebrow.

Blonde eyebrows.

Almost like the blonde hair that used to exist.

"What do you want?" she asks. Her tone is slightly rigid, a bit cold, but nothing brisker than a usual District 7 snow.

Her district partner, Linden, if she remembers his name right, keeps his head slightly low, she two years older than him, he being reaped. "I was just thinking about how brave you are. For volunteering."

Peri holds a hand to her stomach as she laughs, tremors riding all up and down her body. "Listen, thank you for the flattery, but it wasn't me being brave. I know for a fact I am not winning the Games. Perhaps it just might mean I am more stupid than I thought..." she says this with a bit of scorn.

Linden's eyes are glimmering with hope. "I still think it means you're incredibly brave."

She keeps her voice as solid as it can go. Even though she doesn't want people to feel sorry for her anymore, where she flips them off if they even utter the words, 'I am so...' and trail off at the end, Peri reserves some of the sadness left in her, if she can even find it in the darkest and deepest crevices of her soul, for herself. To empty it whenever she gets the chance to. "I got told I had eight months to live, tops," Peri smirks, a smirk full of confidence, full of validity. "Got to go out with a bang, right? Instead of lying at home like a hermit."

His eyes now flicker upwards to her head, and for some strange reason, the curiosity on his face makes Peri feel exposed, so exposed and she wants to cover herself up in front of him. "What color was your hair before you lost it?" There's a strange imbue of innocence behind his tone, wavering kindness and happiness, no remorse, no pain, just a constant wonder.

A lump forms in Peri's throat. "Blonde."

"I bet you looked beautiful."

"I think so..." she bites down on her tongue, feeling the prickle of tears at the corner of her eyes.

Linden reaches over and grabs her hand. "In fact, I think you're the prettiest girl I've ever seen."

Her mind does not compute this, Peri falling back out of shock, mouth slightly agape and open as his words reach her. No one has said that to her in months. Some people have said how pretty she _used_ to look, but this isn't the same thing. This is someone finding out now, herself being the discovering one, what beauty lies in the depths.

Peri's voice is raspy. "You really think so?"

Linden smiles back at her. "I _know_ so."

That just about breaks her, Peri throwing her arms around him in a hug. How could she be so lucky, on the train trip to where she'll die, to have a companion like this fourteen year-old boy with her, this Linden Hazel to be coaching her through the recovery process, through the burial process, and through the resurrection process. When the two break apart, Peri's eyes are swimming with tears, Linden's not much better.

"Thank you," she whispers. "Thank you."

"You're welcome..."

"I bet the next thing you're going to say is that you're sorry. For what's happening to me."

"Not at all," Linden shakes his head.

"What's happening to you clearly has changed you for the better. I am glad you seem so strong... you inspire me."

Peri's heart is practically fluttering at this point, and she squeezes his hand. He's her district partner, she's his... and together from District 7 they could do this, probably. Just positivity and innocence abound.

Peri Florence volunteers with her periodic self-destruction for a reason.

She's been diagnosed with stage three leukemia.

She's got eight months to live.

Could a death in the Hunger Games really harm her any worse?

* * *

 **Well... damn, aren't I positively crying? So, that was Chapter #9: Periodic Self-Destruction, and my last post for the 2018 year. 2018 has been quite the wild ride, guys, where I managed to finish my longest word count story in another fandom called Syrenet, and here I am 3k words away from having 2 million total words written; I want to collapse and never write again. Persevere like Peri!**

 **So yes, in this chapter we met Annabellina Circuit from District 5, Marcus Pharadane from District 1, and Peri Florence from District 7. I'll say upfront that I really enjoyed writing this chapter, and I think this array of tributes that I have, these 24, are absolutely amazing and I cannot wait to try and keep them all alive. I am really feeling alive while writing this story you guys, as nine updates within a twenty-two day period (from Chapter 1 to 9) really is unprecedented for me, I never write this much just for one story, so thank you!**

 **Please review, I'd love to know what you think of the new additions and of course, just your general thoughts. I hope everyone has an amazing and happy New Years Eve or is already in 2019 and is enjoying what'll be to come. I have six projects on my plate for 2019, so let's get through it all! I love you all so much, and I'll probably have the next chapter, Chapter #10: Secrets Behind The Lies out on Saturday or Sunday, January 5th or 6th, where we meet another three tributes. Thanks for an amazing year! Have a great day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	10. Secrets Behind the Lies (Intros III)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #10: Secrets Behind the Lies. Last chapter we met another three tributes, they being Annabellina Circuit (D5), Marcus Pharadane (D1), and Peri Florence (D7). You guys were awesome in your reviews, so thank you, and I am so glad you guys are liking - or mostly liking (cough Hero and Victoria cough) these tributes as I am really trying in 1.5k words to make them come alive. We have another train rides on our hand, and one more after this, but then we're off to the races with the rest of the actual Hunger Games, chapters I've never gotten to write for SYOTS. Enjoy Chapter #10: Secrets Behind the Lies.**

* * *

 _ **Milor Drusus: District 2 Male P.O.V (18)**_

* * *

For the moment in time, all the while trying to keep the buzz of the morning off of his skin, eighteen year-old Career volunteer Milor Drusus looks over at his district partner wondering what in God's name she is doing, or rather _trying_ to do, his fellow Career by his side, the other volunteer he has gotten to slightly know over the last year. His poor district partner is over at the buffet table, eyes searching over muffins and cakes and drinks and fruit platters, and whenever she reaches over for something, she bends down seductively, her breasts practically spilling into the cottage cheese.

Milor is trying his hardest not to laugh, trying his hardest also not to stare. The curve of her hips, the way she is popping out of her reaping outfit, and the also complete look of disappointment on her face as his district partner, Persephone Castor realizes that she is utterly failing at being sexual and succeeding, if their mentor Hale Cornerstone's raised eyebrow is any indicator at the abysmal attempt.

"Persephone, sweetie, what are you doing?" Hale asks, slightly perturbed.

Persephone stands up straighter than a needle, hands immediately going back to buttoning up the front of her dress, a scarlet blush faintly appearing on her cheeks. "I, uh... I'm sorry. My mom told me to try and seduce everyone else and-"

"Is your mother a Hunger Games victor?"

"No ma'am."

"Then I suggest you stop doing that. You aren't going to get Milor's attention doing that."

"The only thing you're arousing is the cottage cheese," Milor cracks at her, laughing even further with her glare, his eyes still trying to roam. He keeps looking back at her chest, all the while splashes of vomit and upheaval of the morning's breakfast hit the back of his throat. _She's beautiful. I want her. You do not want her you stupid boy. She isn't beautiful to you, she's repulsive. You like men._

 _"No I don't,_ " Milor hisses at himself through gritted teeth. As his face twists in upsetting movements, Persephone notices this, frowning, and simply going to peel a banana while Hale lectures her on what actual seduction looks like, giving Milor zero attention. He looks down at his knuckles, at the scars and the red welts from the ruler slapping them, the way the bruises at his father's hands will never fade from his side. There are fossil indentions that ring his neck, faint cerulean and black circles pressed deep into his clavicle, underneath the Adam's apple, and it is what is just the first bought this morning, let alone the last six years.

Milor doesn't want to win the Hunger Games and become victor all because he has some satisfying urge to murder little children and send them home to their mother's and father's with mutilated forms... he wants to win the Hunger Games so he has a legal excuse to snap his father's neck from behind and call it an accident as if his father fell from some sort of high place; as if that would ever go over now with his simple Career Academy status. He's nothing substantial until he wins.

His mind wanders over to his best friend, Frankie, with his muscular build, illuminating emerald eyes, and gentle hands that soothe the tension in his back. Milor shudders, mouth opening for a split second, until he opens his eyes - he hadn't even realized he had closed them - out of fright, afraid a noise might've escaped from his lips. Suddenly, he stands up, interrupting Hale who does not look very pleased about being interrupted. He rubs the back of his neck.

"I need to... will you excuse me?" he babbles over himself, all of a sudden losing the ability in speaking in coherent sentences.

He physically runs away from the rest of them, without even getting added permission, hightailing it to his cabin, Persephone's on the opposite end of the train, his closer to the back by the ending cars. Gray blurs together as he runs from car to car until he's in his own quarters, racing into the bathroom, slamming the door shut, he resting up against it on the other side. He puts a palm up to his face, the physical exertion causing him to be out of breath, sweat pouring down his face. His heart is hammering in his chest, shadows falling over his form, and his breath rate accelerates even quicker for a second, his skin tightening together. For a split second he thinks it is father, Darius, belt in hand, but it is only a passing by tree out on the other side of the train through the window.

Milor lets out a shaky breath, going to the sink, turning on the faucet, splashing water in his face. He looks at himself in the mirror, not recognizing the face of objectified terror staring back at him. His short chestnut colored hair, military Peacekeeper style reveals more of his tan forehead than he likes, accentuating his nearly black eyes, pits of remorse and pain and terror, fright, exultation, euphoria and more. He rests his hands on the side of the sink, letting the water drip off of his nose and into the porcelain basin. Thinking of what Frankie says, even with his chiseled arms and great forceps and thumbs and circling motions, he recalls when the two are training side by side and his best friend places his head against Milor's, placing a gentle hand against the side of his face, gentle enough that a chill runs through him.

" _You're stronger than you think you are, Milor. You'll get through this just fine."_

 _"Frankie, I don't think I can! I-" Milor starts to protest._

The sensuous way Frankie's lips linger on his leaves Milor speechless for a few minutes, all at the expense that Frankie needs Milor to be quiet and keep himself back on track, performed as a favor, and now Milor cannot go twenty minutes without revisiting the moment in his mind. Why didn't he refuse the demand from his father to volunteer and just run away with his best friend? _Why?_

All because Milor knows first hand what would happen.

When Milor is eight, he's caught by his father giving a hug to one of his friends at the time - the kid volunteers for the 97th Hunger Games and dies due to some sort of stomach sickness, so he's no longer to blame for Milor's abnormalities, as Darius will put it - and takes it way too far, sending Milor to some sort of makeshift academy for boys that are experiencing awkwardness in their brains that men are okay to be liked, and all it shows Milor is that this is who he is... and who he is, is someone Milor is sick to be, where he spends nights standing in front of the mirror showering insults at himself, that he's nothing more than a piece of worthless garbage who has been designed for one purpose; to win the Hunger Games, bring fame to District 2 and his family, to date a woman and marry her with a white picket fence house and two gorgeous children with a dog running around the yard. This is him.

This is what Milor Drusus feels like he should be, but this is not the man Milor Drusus wants to be.

His father's chaff hand on his face just a few hours ago leaves Milor shivering in places where he is unable to find them again.

"Do not mess this up," his father says, far more gentle than he's ever been - Frankie's always been gentler, even in his worst moments - and Milor is confused at what exactly this type of love entails. "The Drusus family is long seated in the Academy. If your mother wasn't so insistent on not having your sisters volunteer, then perhaps I wouldn't push you..." he presses his hand harder up against Milor's cheek. "And what are you going to do if any of the other guys up there try getting in your head?"

"I kill them. For trying to make me gay," Milor says resolutely, but in the back of his mind there is a burning rage, as it is Frankie he thinks about on long nights with his hand down low, or of the athletic trainer who leaves a hand resting on his hip trying to correct alignment in his sword stance. Milor hates himself in those few moments than he's ever had in his entire life, and there's a lot of these so called snapshots of this.

He turns off the water, the sound starting to become annoying now. Milor's breathing is still ragged, as he's too damn afraid to think what will happen if these bodily actions translate to other bodily actions that'll get him compromised. However, as he stands there and struggles with the inner mechanisms of his mind, his other half of the brain begins to wizen up. He does not have the time to mull over his thoughts right now, whether he likes it or not he has signed himself up pretty exclusively to volunteer for the 4th Quarter Quell, and he knows that it is indeed an honor to be selected by a place as large as District 2 to be here.

Milor stands up straight, trying to make a serious face, closing his eyes.

When he opens them, a sense of confidence runs through his veins.

There is no more time allotted for Milor Drusus to second guess himself.

He has to get ready.

There's a game he needs to win, and win it he shall, mark his words on Frankie's life.

Even mark it on his father's life.

There's a secret behind Milor's lies, a secret he is sure everyone in Panem can see.

* * *

 ** _Lowelle Sable: District 6 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

She knows full and well that there are a many tributes riding to the Capitol in the very same orientation that she is who would be crying their eyes out, rocking back and forth in the corner. She knows full and well there are tributes sitting there numb to it all, stuck unmoving in some chair in the dining car staring out at the rolling hills and fauna outside. She knows full and well there will be the Career tributes celebrating their stupid decision to volunteer all because some higher-up told them to or that they don't want to dishonor their family and friends. She knows full and well that is like none of them, none of the tributes she described; she's something _more._

Lowelle Sable, seventeen and sharp, is strategizing.

The girl is currently sitting on the bed in her own room, a piece of paper out underneath a book she finds up against the wall. Borrowing a pen from one of her victor mentors, a person in their own room with a needle up their arm, self-medicating and enjoying the beautiful wonders of morphine - personally Lowelle finds this stupid, as it seems like their mentors are not going to be able to help them win this Quarter Quell - she has been sitting on top of her bed for the last hour and a half, unmoving, bent over this piece of paper, writing and doodling and planning away.

Her mind wanders over the tributes she's described in her head, singling out first handedly the weaklings, the wimps. They'll be easy to coax to her side. There isn't often an outer district - yes, Lowelle knows she used her terminology incorrectly, but who cares honestly? - with a confident tribute, no matter the age. If they usually win, as Lowelle has spent the time to study it, they're either monsters hidden in plain sight, or have had some crazy dream to win the Hunger Games at a young age. The typical draw is that if you aren't a Career, you're scared out of your mind, reaped, and going to die. District 3, 5, 8, and 12 seem to be high on the list, Lowelle taps each of the districts she has written down in her planning. Take a terrified twelve year-old from the group, have them trust her, and she can kill them all in their sleep. Lowelle hates the idea of killing another innocent creature, but she wants to survive, right? She is able to do that with enough pushing aside of her morals. A quick draw of the blade across their throat doesn't sound too terrible... as long as it doesn't happen to her.

The second group filters by, the numb ones, the silent ones. These fit hand in hand with the tributes who seem to have mental issues or those who could win the Games, Lowelle rationalizes. Lowelle does not put herself in this category, because she isn't numb to it. She knows exactly what she's going through, what most likely unavoidable doom it spells, and that she's going to get through the best she can lest she wants to fall into a makeshift grave she creates for herself. Lowelle bits on the end of the pen, garnering her options. She's seen the reaping footage, and only one or two tributes fit the terrified toddler syndrome that she's thought of. The numbness is hard to see on camera, so Lowelle figures she'll just have to see it person. She'll find out later tonight and tomorrow, that easy enough. These are harder to discern from, because they might not be as trusting... as aloof. Lowelle grins to herself; it'll be fun trying to break them down.

She also knows herself and knows her skill set. Lowelle has never picked up a knife or a bow or an axe. A welding hammer isn't the same, but is a meager start. She is not scoring higher than a six with mad woman Lewlyn Davis at the helm, who seems to value strength over smarts like the idiot Head Gamemaker she is, and it is always the score that impresses the Careers, not the physicality of what they've done. She is going to be unable to break that group down in the manner that she'll want to, with paranoia and sudden disinterest in each other... maybe even hate.

Lowelle Sable is not delusional. She trying to rip the Career pack apart is akin to her getting a twelve via Lewlyn's grace, she might as well not try.

The girl taps the paper she has, moving on downwards to the Cornucopia design she's created. She truthfully has no idea what the arena is going to be, but since it is a Quarter Quell, nothing has to be cost-effective, it is all going to be extravagant, out of this world creative, and above all, _deadly._ The Cornucopia dimensions she has down, a place where the circle is at least the size of the Justice Building and its surrounding courtyard, maybe two thousand physical square feet, always oval in shape. The arena is another matter.

For the 25th Hunger Games it is a dense wood, where for miles and miles is just that, _woods._ The trees are packed so tightly together that you could hardly go running through them without tearing up your clothes or getting cut. The 50th, where that drunkard Haymitch Abernathy wins is a beautiful, bountiful paradise of lethality, from poisonous water and food to ravenous mutts that could eat Lowelle alive in seconds. The 75th, fresh in everyone's minds, a tropical world that is divided into twelve rings of death, twelve horrors that the tributes are subjected to... so what could the 100th have in store for her?

Lowelle just hopes it does not involve bugs. If it involves bugs, she might as well just throw in the towel. She's never told a soul about her innate fear that paralyzes her from the waist down, unable to move at all, but leave it to the Capitol to discover the skeletons in her closet. She mulls over what the last ten arenas had been, from when Lowelle remembers at the earliest watching them and screaming at the terrifying deaths. Lowelle is unable to hold the anger in her mind from unleashing into her veins at the rage she feels when their blasted escort pulls her name from the bowl earlier today, but she has to keep it under containment lest she full into the numb, mentally insane category.

She has the following arenas written down in chronological order; she smiles at the ordeal planning. She can bet her life that there is no one doing this right now. Again, either freaking out, sitting mellow and silent, or rejoicing... they can take their pick, Lowelle's picked hers. She is planning everyone else's deaths.

 _90th: Volcanic wasteland, where no trees grew, nowhere to hide. Half of the tributes died from monoxide poisoning of some kind. Highly unlikely to ever be repeated._

 _91st: An island that would sink day after day, where on the tenth day, the arena would only contain the Cornucopia and slightly surrounding trees. Three tributes died from drowning to the rising waters, another third of the rest dying on the tenth day when they were all pushed together in one last brawl at the Cornucopia. Could be revisited._

 _92nd: One of the Capitol's old landmarks, a massive house out in the middle of nowhere as house appliances came alive and targeted the tributes. Mutts killed eleven tributes, the Careers killed the rest. Never going to be used again, the Capitol likes tribute versus tribute violence._

 _93rd, 94th, and 95th: Variations of a forest with different climates, one freezing, one middle temperature where everything is rotten, and one fresh in bloom, all waiting to kill. No forest setting for a Quell, too plain._

 _96th and 97th: A skyscraper for the 96th that collapsed due to structural failure. The victor survives from only receiving a minor concussion. 97th is the ruins of old said arena with hiding places being burnt and destroyed buildings. Cannot be used again._

 _98th: An aquatic setting, something like a submarine with guns and artillery and weapons of mass destruction. Tributes used less primitive methods to kill everyone. Not going to be used again._

 _99th: A water park, with water slides and lagoon pools and places to swim. A more traditional Hunger Games. Idea can be slightly revisited._

 _100th: ?_

Lowelle sits back, looking over at the choices. There is hardly any correlation to them. She has no idea why Lewlyn is so praised as a Head Gamemaker when her designs from the 93rd to the 97th year had little to no variety, but weren't necessarily the same exact arena. The one that pops out at her is the 99th year, in specific, Lowelle leaning in to read it again. She knows there are all of these monuments that the Capitol could use, old attractions and places from eras gone by, and all they have to do is build a dome over the massive area... that's it, and perhaps that is a sign of laziness, but she could care less at this point.

Someone knocks on the back of her door, a muffled voice, sounding like her poor district partner that Lowelle already forgot the name of. She's being signaled to dinner.

She quickly wraps up her piece of paper into a notebook found on the table next to her bed, shoving that underneath the covers just in case her district partner decides to go snooping.

Lowelle lands onto the carpet as gracefully as she can, pausing to look back at the book. No one can know about it, no about her plans or what she wants to do. She turns back to the door, setting her shoulders.

She can handle a dinner with her district partner, it is the Hunger Games she has to be worried about.

* * *

 ** _Caiden Grove: District 11 Male P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

He is honestly more horrified to see a mutation than another tribute in the Games at this point. Caiden Grove, sitting at the dinner table with his mentors and district partner is not focusing on the conversation at hand, one hand underneath his chin, but moreso focusing on what's ahead in his train of thought, at the thought of meeting some poor sheep ripped to shreds by a wild invalid, by a wild Gamemaker with no human heart or compassion. He physically shudders, enough to draw the attention of everyone at the table, though there isn't much tangible dialogue going on between them.

"Caiden?" asks the female victor sitting at the table, Melody Elder, victor of the 82nd year of the Games, burly and brawn, being a daughter with six other siblings, she's fought for her fair share of the pickings and prize, winning by using night vision goggles she stole from a Career at the Cornucopia to sneak up on opponents unsuspecting and backstab them. The years have been kind to her, as has her heart melted into a more motherly one. "What's wrong?"

A pink twinge appears on his cheeks, Caiden setting down his fork. "I, uh- I was just thinking about the mutts in the arena. What they would look like."

"Why?"

His district partner, Alexandra, quaint, pretty simplistic in looks, but appeasing enough, friendly enough, eats a few peas off of her plate. "Caiden loves animals. He hates seeing what the Gamemakers create."

Melody raises an eyebrow. "I thought the two of you didn't know each other?"

Alexandra goes for another bite. "My father buys some of the apples Caiden grows in his backyard."

All Caiden goes is shrug, not disagreeing. There is something comforting to him about being in the sun, where as most would be complaining about it and wanting to go home, whereas Caiden could stand out there all day on the ladders and stuck in the midst of branches and watch little hatchlings in their mother's nest chirp at him as he picks the apples above the birds' heads. At sixteen, the mandatory age when school is no longer a priority, and since he has such a love for the orchards, Caiden drops out to start working in the fields longer than any normal sixteen year-old probably ever would. With permission from the Mayor, he goes and plants four separate apple trees in the backyard of their house, although his family sure finds it strong.

He sometimes sees Alexandra through the crack of the open doorway to her house as Caiden sells her father a few of the best of the best he gets with the harvest, but he doesn't speak to her. As far as he can tell, she's plainly, and he doesn't need to waste his time with plainness, not when there is a world of beauty out there for him to explore. Sometimes he will stay out in the fields past the normal time, when the Peacekeepers have to come and nearly remove him off the property, all because Caiden is laying down on his back in the soil staring up at the night sky, amazed by the way the stars twinkle, how high the moon is in the sky, and that one day he wishes to see what is beyond there, beyond the veil of black.

The day, this entire day, is tainted black, a sour taste in his mouth. He looks down at his hands, frowning. Melody and Alexandra are back to conversing. There's no way these hands of his, as burly as they may look, will be able to kill. Caiden is tall for his age, at around 6'2, but he doesn't know where in the spectrum he lies anymore, as he's always in motion, never sedentary and in place for life to get a good reading on him. His dark skin shines in the sun, glistening pearls of sweet warmness by an even kinder heart.

If he has to settle on a weapon, Caiden suggests weakly to his family that perhaps he can use a machete, having swung it back and forth before while trying to get apples that the very tips of his fingers are unable to get, but even then, he suggests it weakly. It hasn't taken a foot hold in his heart yet to become a reality, but he also knows that if it comes down to a younger Career running at him to kill him, Caiden is swinging that machete blade and trying to take the kid's head clean off, to go and puke in the woods shortly thereafter.

He nibbles on a sweet roll, the taste succulent, almost as lovely as a juicy bite into a Golden apple, with halcyon skin, kissed by the sun in flavor.

Caiden wonders, even for a second, but a second is sometimes enough to determine a rational decision or curiosity, what blood tastes like? It surely is not going to be sweet of any kind, but he expects that. Is it messed up for him to even think like that?

He shrugs, finishing the rest of the roll.

He supposes he can find out for himself soon enough, right?

As he eats, he looks over at one of the platters containing a wild hog on it, caught and killed on the outskirts of District 11, and Caiden's sitting there at the table when the Avoxes bring it with the rest of the meal. The way its beady eye is positioned to stare at him causes shivers to run through Caiden's body, shivering to where he needs to go take a hot bath.

Nothing on his plate contains meat, he loves nature too much, and there's no way another animal should be food for him.

Apparently for the arena, he is going to go back to meat if he wants to survive. A man cannot live in the arena for as long as some victors have on roots, nuts, and foliage alone.

There's a time he can find that for himself soon enough, right?

Caiden shrugs again, for no reason.

" _The lies I tell,"_ he says with sadness, " _Maybe they'll catch up in the arena to me. Who knows..."_

While Caiden sits there, on the fringes of the conversation, his mind thinks about the horrors of the days before him. If only he decided to grow one last apple tree before embarking back to the arena... if he only watched which chemicals he added into the soil so the apples contained a hint more of flavor.

This is a God punishing a defiler for their sins... and Caiden is soon to face them, his secrets covered by lies, covered by his love for nature, and covered by that sweet smile of his as he holds the machete blade.

Caiden looks down at his hands again. Could these hands kill?

"Absolutely..." he says aloud.

* * *

 **Alrighty guys, another chapter down! This was Chapter #10: Secrets Behind the Lies, and oh my god ya'll, I've reached 2 MILLION WORDS written since I started my account in 2013... and damn I want to cry, like holy hell, but I digress.**

 **Anyways, we've met another three vastly different tributes: Milor Drusus of District 2, Lowelle Sable of District 6, and Caiden Grove of District 11, and it seems like each of these people have reached a new form to this chapter title, something they're all hiding. Please let me know what you think of them, and give kudos to the other wonderful submitters who wrote these characters for me to make alive. I promise you that the everyday updates will stop soon enough. There is one more train rides chapter, #11, which I will be posting on Thursday, the 3rd, but then I'll probably only post chapters on the weekend as my next semester of college starts on Monday and I am moving to my dorm on Friday.**

 **Please review, you guys, as I love your commentary! I will have Chapter #11: Formulaic Emotions, with the last three districts no one has a P.O.V from yet, Districts 3, 8, and 9. Thank you all so much for your support, that I am at 2 MILLION WORDS guys, and for everything else. Have an amazing day! Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	11. Formulaic Emotions (Intros IV)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #11: Formulaic Emotions. I am super excited to announce I have officially gotten over my terrible hump of tribute introductions (yes, I know there's twelve more tributes to meet, you'll meet them with the tributes' next four chapters as well), that always has stopped me in the past, as this is the last train ride chapter and I get to move onto bigger and better aspects of the games, something I am so excited about, as we also return to the Capitol storyline! Last chapter we met Milor Drusus, Lowelle Sable, and Caiden Grove, who are all hard to read, but I think you'll warm up to them. Enjoy Chapter #11: Formulaic Emotions.**

* * *

 ** _Rochelle Pascal: District 3 Female P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

She is able to say without a doubt that she has never been more humiliated, and more embarrassed in her entire life. Getting called up to the reaping stage, some asshole girl from the eighteen year-old crowd with a strange vendetta against her knocking her glasses off of her face. Groping around blindly in the dark - dark in _her_ eyes, or rather lack thereof - is embarrassing as the district goes in uproar, the escort takes pity on her, and she then trips up the stairs unceremoniously while fumbling to put her lenses back on.

That is Rochelle Pascal's morning, and she only wonders how everyone else's compared to her. She almost doesn't even move when the escort calls her name, reading it from the paper slip, as she tries not to go by that name anymore, Shelly sounding far more practical, but for the purposes of the Games, and for the Capitol, she has to march herself up there and die. She hears from the escort, as she is blindly looking for the very thing that helps her see, that the bully - Rochelle will use the word bully, but she prefers vigilante instead - only did it due to how ridiculous her glasses were... large wire frames, the left far bigger than the right, held together on a flimsy connective piece of electrical tape. Yes, she knows that it looks absolutely ridiculous, but who cares, it helps get her around.

Rochelle is lying down on one of the larger couches in the dining car, all the while her district partner is ravenously jumping from platter to platter, piling his plate a mile high with god knows what. She's never seen such exotic things. Like... what the hell is a crepe? What in God's good Earth is fondue? It sounds poisonous to her. Preferably, as Rochelle is watching her partner - she thinks his name is Deacon, something like that, something _stupid_ \- that she'd much rather go in the Games alone. Not even have him by her side, that doesn't seem to bad, because where is his manners? She shudders as he swallows pieces of fruit whole without chewing them, but that might be because the kid hasn't had anything to eat in the last four days. She doesn't know.

She also doesn't really want to ask.

The girl curls in on herself some, hands going down to her body. Her hands being present on her chest fills the back of her mouth with a severe distaste. As she is fumbling around for her glasses, there's talk behind her, talk from the people around her, voices who say nothing yet say everything at the same time. Rochelle pictures their faces perfectly, with talons and faces that sag like leather, scowls and snarling mouths twisted into cavernous holes for caves... and the words they say are barbed, puncturing, wounding, _evil._

 _Where's her breasts? God, with that short hair she looks like a boy! Are you sure, mayor, that she's supposed to be in the girl section? She looks like you with a bit more makeup. I'd hate to be her and how ugly she looks._

Rochelle thinks she hears this, but it seems to come from mirrors in her house instead of the other way around, and as she hears these voices in the mirror, tones in the sky, she is pointing directly back at the mirror and criticizing it. _Your frame is too big. You are dirty and have the reflective surface of dog shit._ Yelling at inanimate objects is fun, even with your parents in the room. Although she is known not to be a scrapper by any sort of means, there's still a very noticeable gash on her right knuckle from when she slams her hand into it, shards of glass falling to the floor everywhere. As she picks a piece up, which cuts her, blood as black as her hair at this point, sounds come from it, hushed whispers, and she drops it to the ground. It is a sound of her screaming, as if she had drawn the shard quickly across her skin.

" _There's no need for that,"_ Rochelle tells herself whilst laying on the couch, " _A Career will most likely do that to me with a sword..._ "

She feels like, if someone were to ever hear her thoughts or see the things she has gone through, Rochelle has to point out that she isn't suicidal. With her short, dark hair, she also doesn't feel any attraction to other women either... she is just... misunderstood. Looking back over at her district partner, at Deacon, hands going back to the side of her head to remove the notice that there is no form to her chest like some fifteen year-olds, she cannot stop watching him eat like a damn idiot without any manners. Not to mention that the sounds are absolutely repulsive.

"Hey, do you mind not eating to sloppily? It's gross and I am sick of hearing it," she snaps, sitting upright.

Her district partner, that dumb boy named Deacon - were his parents high on bath salts when he is given that name at the hospital, or what? - who has his fork hallway in his mouth, stops, slamming it down on the plate. "Well, excuse me princess. Sorry for enjoying myself."

"You can enjoy yourself in a more dignified manner."

"How about you go screw off?" Deacon makes a fake smile. "Can you do that for me?" He picks up his plate and storms out of the dining car, in the direction of his room at the back of the train.

Rochelle watches him go, keeping an eye on his rear end - hot damn, she's never seen something so perfect. Hey, it's there for her to look! Don't judge! - and then trails her eyes up as he enters through the sliding glass door. Then, sticking a hand on her hip. "Happily," she scowls, going to lie back down, this time in peace and quiet, a wonderful peace and quiet.

She knows she shouldn't be so damn judgmental of someone that she's never met, it is something Rochelle is trying to get better at, but there are certain things that just rub her the wrong way. Sloppy manners, especially towards eating. Partner work in a group. Being single. Being overwhelmed by the fact that she is in the Hunger Games now, and there's no getting out of it. She needs to stop being so judgmental of herself, but when the fake whispers start, there's nothing that can make them stop.

Looking back, looking past the old parts of herself, the things she's tried leaving behind, they all seem to follow her and wreak havoc in her life when let on the loose. There's nothing she can do about it, in a sense that is because Rochelle is allowing that to happen, but then, just then, looking at Deacon and his underwhelming presence in the dining car, Rochelle snaps because she allows it. How can she worry so heavily about what other people think of her when all she does is criticize?

Rochelle tries putting a positive spin on that ideal, if she even can, but keeps coming up empty with a decently reasonable answer, nothing sound in her evidence of what being a bitch does for other people. She gets told all the time - okay, primarily by her parents, but that's a whole other matter - how nice and kind she is, how humble she is for having the mind of Machiavelli, a tyrant at the knowledge game. Rochelle is able to recite the entire Alphabet in four different languages yet uses incorrect grammar when speaking English, but she tries forgetting that ever happens.

She sits up suddenly, going back to the Machiavelli comparison. A renowned writer, putting into perspective some transformative works on ruling and philosophy... and of course, his amazing intelligence. She sits up higher now, back resting against one of the arms of the couch, the cogs in her brain twisting and turning. She isn't malicious, Rochelle isn't a fighter, but she's a quick learner, at cheetah speed... and she then looks back at the way Deacon had exited from, water vapor creating clouds inside her brain, the reflection of an azure sky, of a perfect day.

Strategy.

How she can be Machiavelli, be loved by the people, to be loved by the Capitol populace, and win the damn thing. She looks down at her hands, smooth hands, extremely pale hands, but hands that have worked arduously, fingers that have never curled around the hilt of a sword as she swings back and forth at the trainer. How it seems too good to be true that she can do this, despite her affinity for a lack of physical activity.

Rochelle swings her legs up and over the couch, a grin growing on her face.

"Who needs sleep..." she tells herself. "I have work to do!"

Standing up, Rochelle pushes down her hair a bit flatter, then pulling down on the hem of her skirt. There's someone on this train very important to her, very valuable, and it all starts with two little words.

Two little words that Rochelle does not often say in her day to day life as common as she wishes to, even though her family has taught her the upmost level of respect they could has her thinking thoughts like Deacon's name is stupid, or that Deacon should be dead before long... he has to let Deacon find his own way, without Rochelle's interference in his plains. Maybe there'd be a way...

Rochelle dashes out of the dining car in the same direction as Deacon when they got on, hands by her sides.

It looks like she'll need her district partner on her side.

And from first glance, Rochelle feels like it is going to suck.

* * *

 ** _Galiant Rushmohone: District 8 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

"You couldn't win the Games, no way," says fifteen year-old Galiant Rushmohone, he crossing his arms and legs together, tilting his head somewhat at his district partner, a skinny, quite frail looking Indian girl named Marina. His comment stems from the fact, while they're talking just to keep the awkwardness down, that she has hope, this tiny little old thing has hope about victory. "Just look at you."

"You aren't a Career yourself, you know," Marina snaps back at him. "Your chances of winning are just as good as mine."

Galiant runs a hand through his long blonde hair, long enough that it sometimes obscures his eyes, keeping his arms crossed, but he doesn't say anything just yet back to that. Actually, he does, in his head. _You don't know me. You don't know what I can and what I can't do._ Truth be told, only a fifteen, Galiant is pretty sure there's a lot he cannot do and he's okay with that, but there's so much deep down inside him he cannot tell the outside lest they'll judge him, lest they'll poke holes in his story and that is not about to happen. Statistically - yes, Galiant knows full and well he is pulling this out of his ass - District 8, and District 8 males specifically, are at greater odds to win the Games. After all, it is their own Cranston Ervack from District 8, the mayor's son, who wins the very 1st games, tributes chosen and taken in the night by the Capitol who were in some marquee standing in the early onset Panem. So, even though Galiant doesn't know anything about archery and is not the son of some district mayor - _shit, he wishes he is, not just some drunk ass lady who swears all the time_ \- there could be a good chance for him to win.

An even greater chance to die, however.

Everything about him screams designed incorrectly, from the fact he does not live in a shabby looking house, yet the people inside it are worse for wear. He is tall, but skinny with no bulk to him. He has a sharply lined jaw, and softness comes out. There's a solid stone for his body, and a melting heart of gold. It changes temperature by day, usually lowering, but he has to handle what he gets. There are nights that Galiant cries himself to sleep, feeling as worthful as a pence piece, but then there are nights he is on top of the moon as if he just managed to snag tesserae for the eightieth time in a row and he'll be eating bread till he dies... which could be next week.

All due to the woman who smokes, all due to the woman who holds a frying pan in one hand, a liquor bottle in the other. All due to the man who does not appear in the family photos, who has held his son by the throat against the wall in a drunken stupor of his own... and Galiant blinks it all away with mornings of anger, spewing words of hatred, and arrogance that he is above it all.

There is no way he is not getting reaped. His name is in that bowl almost two hundred times, he standing there in that line to apply so much that a Peacekeeper tells him that no family goes this hungry anymore, not even in District 12, not with Calhoun starting to phase out things... that he is going on a suicide mission, and Galiant nods his head, he nods his head _hard._ Had he not been reaped, he would repeat the process, going to try and snag two hundred and one times his slip is in the see-through bowl. He has thought about bashing the sea serpent's head up against a wall, craving the way it lights up his skin, the way his already pale soul turns translucent, light filtering through him, and how the copper streaks start to run down his hands.

So, when he does, Galiant simply closes his eyes and smiles. He wants to win this so badly, but talking about it like he will to anyone else is just a sign of arrogance, something he is readily to equip at any moment's notice, Marina seeming like good target practice.

Marina runs a hand nervously down her leg, over the fabric of her dress, she looking down at her hands, then back up at Galiant, who is off staring outside the window of the train car they're in, the sun starting to set. They'll be arriving at the Capitol within the hour, he's pretty sure, and he doesn't need Marina looking at him all the time.

"Clearly you want to say something, so say it, you idiot," he says, and the insult seems to come out of his mouth like water off of a wing. She doesn't seem perturbed by it.

Apparently, as Galiant has heard from her, since Marina does not shut up apparently - _since she's such an idiot, it probably isn't her vocabulary to be quiet,_ he thinks to himself, adding an ounce of snark to his inward tone - she has a head for numbers and is helping the mayor with running the political Games side of District 8. He knows that has to be a bit macabre, but it this is coming from the boy, ever since he turns eleven that he watches the Games with earnest, cheering on his favorites, booing when they're killed, entertaining the idea for moments in time, stuck in amber, that he'll be there one day, but Galiant never wishes it fully, not truly. There's so much more in life than going at a young age and dying. He isn't stupid, even his arrogant self knows he won't last a full day.

 _Then, Galiant, why did you sign up for tesserae so much? Why did you put yourself in a suicide mission like this?_

The back of his throat is liquid fire, it scalding and hurting whenever he opens his mouth to speak. _"It completes me," he says, hanging his head low._

"How many times was your name in the reaping jar today?" she asks him.

Galiant presses one elbow on the windowsill, raising his eyebrow. He didn't think that'd be the question she'd ask. "197," he answers, and even saying it aloud, a chill runs through his body.

Marina's eyes widen, as if someone stabbed her in the gut with a spear made of ice. Galiant feels shame wash over his body, as he's broken the record, announced happily, oh so damn happily by the escort of Galiant's achievement - perhaps he is a bit more macabre than he likes to be, more than Marina, if this is his greatest achievement - that he has the highest amount of slips in the reaping, not just for District 8, but for the entire history of the Hunger Games across all twelve districts for the last hundred years. Even the Career volunteers who leap forward at the opportunity, they have slips in the bowl as well, and it is ironic sometimes when they're reaped, choosing to volunteer as is, but still.

"197..." Marina repeats, her facial expression aghast.

"Yeah, I know. It's a lot," Galiant says, wanting the conversation to end already. He doesn't know this girl, he doesn't have any prior connections with her, so why is she forcing something on him like this? What kind of sick and twisted girl is she to do this to him? "A lot more than anyone else. Hadn't I not been picked... I probably would've volunteered then."

"Why would you do something awful like that?"

"Perhaps I just really like the Hunger Games and really want to go," Galiant replies sardonically, keeping one elbow on the windowsill, he now resting his head up against it. _You're lying. You just made sure that this year is the year you were picked... you knew what you were doing._

Marina runs a hand down her leg nervously again. "I heard that there was a tribute that had signed up for tesserae so many times, like... I don't even know how many times it said..."

"Sixty-two times, Marina," Galiant squeezes his eyes shut, even admitting this fact is going to cause him to cry and dammit, he does not cry in front of thirteen year-old little idiot girls like Marina Penweather just because she's his district partner.

Her eyes widen even more than that, her reaction a lance in his heart. "Why so many times, Galiant?"

He gives a weak smile, his voice dissipating at the end. "Because it got me away from my mother. I'd stand there in line for two hours a day, because I needed something to do, and I needed the food. I felt more loved by the district officials who ran that office than my home..." he looks away again, Galiant actually having to bite down on his tongue to stem the emotional flow.

Marina sits forward some, going to rest a hand on his leg, but Galiant recoils away sharply, even hissing. Her face falls. "I'm sorry, Galiant. I wish you could've had better parents..."

" _Parent,_ " Galiant corrects. "My father? Who knows where the hell he is. My mother? Instead of being a physicist like she wanted to, when my dad left, she turned to drinking. I have a drunkard whore for a mom..." and then he breaks, Galiant scooting forward, hands going to his eyes, a wail erupting from his throat as he sits there in that chair, with the setting sun, Marina's gentle hand on his back rubbing circles into his shoulder blades, as he weeps, as he sobs, as he cries as if God has granted him permission.

The world didn't give Galiant Rushmohone any love.

Why should Galiant Rushmohone give any love back to the world?

Perhaps learning how to kill in the arena will be the best way for him to enact revenge on the cruel injustices of an already cruel unjust society... perhaps it'll be the way he can use his death journal, where he writes the deaths he'll fantasize about on other people, maybe he can use that, so Galiant has the excuse, the rightful excuse to call himself a monster of the Underworld.

These emotions are formulaic, and Galiant knows this.

As he hides in the corner, or in his closet, his mom looming over him with the frying pan in one hand, swigging from the bottle, there's the crash and smash of something heavy down on his skull and then Galiant's world goes dark.

Perhaps all of this is a dream now... and Galiant is truthfully not going to his death.

It'd be quite the dream.

Galiant hopes he never wakes.

* * *

 ** _Blake Hanley: District 9 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

It seems that the world does not want Blake Hanley, eighteen now, not even needing to go into the district for tesserae, to grow old. It seems as if that is something he cannot check off of the bucket list anymore, ' _growing old_ ', and oh how he wants to do it so badly. There's so much he can do, but instead he is sitting down on the most uncomfortable seat on the entire Capitol train to head off towards the Hunger Games, and here he is, reaped, on the last year this can happen, almost out of the grasp of Panem's vicious claws, inching away as fast as he can, and then he's snagged. Blake doesn't even cry when he's picked... he just shrugs his shoulders, tilts his head back and laughs.

He only cries, of course, when he says goodbye to his parents, brother, and girlfriend. Then does Blake allow himself a miniature release of emotion, cathartic in nature like he expects. He laughs only because, _of course,_ it's a Quarter Quell. If he is going to die in the arena, he might as well die the most gruesome way possible instead of just a sword to the stomach, which he expects would be the usual way to go out. Now, he is going to probably be forced to have sex with some tree while creatures in said tree shoot tiny arrows at him. His wild sense of imagination has no bounds.

What has always made him the most uncomfortable about the reapings, of course forgetting the looming fact that any one of them can be picked to die - Exhibit A, Blake Hanley, please stand up - is how similar it looks like home, even though home is a good mile away walk from the heart of District 9. He lives in a world called The Circle, and he calls it a world because it honestly is. It is a part of the district, that once stepping into it, it is an entirely new and different environment, one that causes shivers to run up his spine and freak out, not understanding exactly why home gives him the creeps.

The Circle gets its name due to its shape, designed like the namesake, perfect in structure, probably overseen by the very first Panem president. Blake steps on historic ground, historic _blood-soaked_ ground. Rumor has it, from those who might still be alive from the early days, around the 9th or 10th Hunger Games and in their nineties, that this area, The Circle, is the last battle of the rebellion against the Capitol, and the Capitol wipes the rebel army off the face of Panem with the most vile sorts of weapons that can be found, and the death toll across all the districts is a staggering number that even the most hearty and Capitol-supporting people of District 9 have to lose their lunch over... and so it is this fact that warms and tickles the very foundations of Blake's heart.

The Circle is the primary market for the district, where all the shops are, the Hanley family running one. The first thing his district partner asks him, a girl named Marissa who seems more plain-Jane than anyone he has ever met, is that she recognizes him by joining her father on trips to The Circle and stopping by their store for supplies, is if Blake is rich. It is a known fact that there are merchant classes in every other district, including poor old District 12, which Blake is surprised to hear given usually how gravelly and hideous everyone from that coal exhibit looks like, soot colored hair and survival skills like a toddler. Blake leans his head back and laughs - second time he's laughed in the day - at her comment, because Blake Hanley is not rich, he's not in the 'Merchant Class' of District 9's economy, as such a thing does not exist, he's simply a 'Merchant' living in a slovenly built house behind their shop, poor as the rest of District 9, but a different type of poor.

For all the years of the Hunger Games that he's been eligible to be reaped, Blake never stops by the district office to sign up for tesserae, as his poorness only goes toward certain aspects of his life. He is never starving, meager portions sure, but content enough to fill his heart. Living in District 9, there's an abundance of bread all around him, so much in fact that he feels overwhelmed by it, a joy, but overwhelmed.

Blake wants to call it chance, pretty much, that Marissa, his district partner, has ever seen him, as he's always out in the fields harvesting his share of the work, trying to work as fast as he can to do more down the breadline in duties he has to perform. He isn't bothered by the work, touching the stalks and the ears and everything in between crop and grain wise has always filled him with a sense of calming, only ever rising in rage underneath his skin the moment a Peacekeeper comes running over and starts beating one of the other coworkers with a whip because they aren't 'harvesting' fast enough.

He has to quell the rage in him to never snap back. " _You think it is so easy? You come here and do it then?"_ That'll get him whipped, and maybe worse, and all Blake has to do is open his smart-ass mouth once and he'll get it handed to him in a way he doesn't want it to be handed to him.

He works in the fields until dusk, fingers sore, skin cracked and bleeding, and he's exhausted, but Blake Hanley is proud, because he's skating by while his parents keep the shops up. He makes it back in time throughout the day to see the executions, mutilations, the punishments... and it is why The Circle is known for being _blood-soaked_ ground beyond that battle in the rebel war. The Circle, given its permanent design, is the place where the Peacekeepers hold and host all of the judgments for breaking the law, and Blake has to watch as some old mother with five kids is stealing from one of the local shops - _just an extra piece of bread,_ they all beg - and they lose the arm that did the stealing... and that is perhaps even worse than death, as no arms means you cannot work in District 9... and Blake keeps his hands in his pockets.

However, one night, as Blake is coming home from work, those hands nearly come out of his pockets. It is a normal night, the stars out, the air getting warmer and warmer as the season begins shifting into the heart of summer, when he stops dead in the entrance way to The Circle, eyes locked face-to-face with the terrified look of his brother, Jack, being held down by Peacekeepers, fighting and fighting so hard that the Peacekeepers have to gag him. The blade is raised high, it falls down, and Blake's brother loses his right arm.

All Blake can see is red. He's seen many of these operations and punishments over the years, and it is terrible for him to admit that he is desensitized to all of it, but for a second, in his ledger, all he sees is pure fury, crimson marking the ground, as seeing his family lose a limb, to lose their own copper river of life... he makes a start forward, Jack's eyes widening in between the pain and his screams, that Blake stills in his motions, ready to go blazing saddles on the Peacekeepers. There's only four in the square, he could probably take them... but that means Blake knows he's going to lose more than just a limb if he engages in said action... so he stops.

The look on his brother's crestfallen face haunts Blake to this day, and it is been a month, he unable to remove it, unable to get it out of his head.

He strains a bit from his seat, too lazy to find a new place to sit, when the sky seems to brighten tenfold from the already sitting sun. There... there it is, and he always thought the place is some sort of myth, a fake gilded palace covered in ice or shimmering jewels... but it is real. The Capitol sits on the horizon.

Blake swallows heavily.

There's no turning back. There's no more regrets he can hold onto... he has to go out there and win the Hunger Games.

He can't get his brother's face away from his memory, his brother now jobless, one arm less... and he might very well lose - Jack, that is - his own brother too.

Blake needs to win.

Blake can win.

He can do this... he thinks.

It seems as if he might need all the help he can get.

The 100th Hunger Games has finally arrived, the 4th Quarter Quell on its way, and all Blake Hanley is going to be is one more little sheep led to the slaughter.

* * *

 **Hey, a 5k chapter! Right on! Anyways, that was Chapter #11: Formulaic Emotions, the last of the four train ride chapters, and so far we've met Colt (D12 M), Maisey (D4 F), Hero (D10 M), Annabellina (D5 F), Marcus (D1 M), Peri (D7 F), Milor (D2 M), Lowelle (D6 F), and Caiden (D11 M). Now, with this one, we've met Rochelle (D3 F), Galiant (D8 M), and Blake (D9 M)… and that's just half of the group, wait until you meet the other twelve!**

 **I hope you guys are just as excited as I am, because again, I haven't reached this point in any of my SYOTS and this is just the icing on the cake that we're here. The next chapter, Chapter #12: Under the Veil, will probably be posted sometime next weekend, maybe early in the week since you know me, but I do go back to college and the semester literally starts on Monday, the 7th, so there might be a bit longer to get chapters out, as god, I've written nine chapters for this story since December 22nd, a twelve day period where I just wouldn't stop writing, haha. Chapter 12 is the tribute parade, you'll meet another four characters, and then we get back to those Capitol storyline chapters too which I am so excited about.**

 **What do you think of our new three tributes today? What about the rest we've met on the train rides... and have you been able to pick out contenders? Excited to see what you all think! I love you all so much, and thank you for the characters you've created as this story obviously won't be happening without you guys too giving me these tributes. Give yourself a pat on the back. And please review, as you know I'd greatly appreciate it. We're into Phase 3 of the story, the area before the Bloodbath... which I am aiming to be Chapter 22, so only eleven chapters away. Have an amazing day you guys! Thanks again! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	12. Under the Veil (Intros V)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #12: Under the Veil, which is going to be about the tribute parade which is something I have never gotten to write for my own SYOTS in a quite long time, and I am very excited to get on with it. I have officially moved into my dorm and had my first day of classes so I am getting acclimated. Since the semester has just started, I am going to get as much writing as I can get done. My hope is to have one chapter a week, write some every day if I can manage. I hope you guys enjoy Chapter #12: Under the Veil!**

* * *

 ** _Gaia Whisp: District 12 Female P.O.V (13)_**

* * *

Sensory overload. That is all her mind can think of right now as she is lying down, and despite having her eyes closed, the amount of movement she can sense behind them is starting to make even having her eyes shut annoy her. A strong smell of perfume, if that is what Gaia Whisp is able to assume it is, having smelled her grandmother's old bottle a few years ago - invades her nostrils, a sickly sweet smell like roses, strong and very overpowering where she has to raise a hand up to her nose to keep the smell from ripping her nose off of her face.

A wave of coolness washes over her body, and Gaia feels very exposed, her clothes being discarded to the side as she is currently naked, lying down on the table while her prep team - a pair, brother and sister, who don't seem to talk very much in more than finger pointing and nodding their heads, Chime and Clang, names which Gaia finds to be absolutely ridiculous - work at her hair and scrubbing her body down with a thick brush or sponge hybrid tool. Gaia knows what it is like to be naked, standing in front of a mirror and looking at her reflection, but this... this is something else and there's never been a worse shame in her life.

All she hopes for is that she doesn't die first.

With her eyes closed, she can still picture him standing on top of that mine plate, running like hell to the Cornucopia, and getting a sword in her chest. She remembers, just a year ago, at twelve years-old, what it felt like to watch her brother die. The pain that ripples through her, the scream that rips itself from her throat, the burning agony she is experiencing as she stands there, hand up to her mouth, shocked at how just _bright_ blood is on the grass... and nothing else has seemed worse.

So imagine her devastating reaction when the escort pulls out her name this year from the reaping bowl, her parents are nearly shot by Peacekeepers because of their reaction, not having just their son, but their daughter brought into the Games makes Gaia burst into tears. Her skin is cold, clammy, caught over by a chill where all she can feel is numbness, where even the tears streaking down her cheeks are unregistered by herself emotionally, watching her parents be evicted - luckily just removed from the Square - by the Peacekeepers, and that is until she looks up at the massive Colt Sheppard, her district partner, that is reaped.

And likewise, her throat goes _gulp_ when he removes himself from the crowd.

" _He's going to rip me apart..._ " her mind laments, and she shakes his hand as heartily as a numb, emotionally cold person as she can. When they board the train, she keeps to herself, and has kept to herself the whole time. All she can think about is how she doesn't truly react when her parents say goodbye to her... and then she remembers, she _remembers,_ she recalls this so hard that she falls to the floor in agony, hands clutching her head as the pain is too intense.

She has no family. With James gone, that is it... she's all alone. Her family, her mother and father, they died in a mining accident. An explosion, she believes to be the answer, not just a mine collapsing... and there's fire lacing her skin, smoke billowing from her body, and the strangest smell rising up from the floorboards. The family she sees reacting violently is the female tribute from last year, not _her,_ never her... there's no one to mourn her now.

Gaia keeps her arms down, afraid to lift them up. There are strange multi-colored lights in her face, terrifying almost, but enough color to cascade off of them that makes her feel beautiful. One of the people on the prep team - Chime, Gaia is certain of it, as Chime is definitely a feminine name - hands her a sickly green bedsheet looking thing, Gaia wrapping that around her body as she sits up, her prep team duo walking out. Chime turns to her, directing a finger down, and the frail thirteen year-old assumes that just means ' _stay_ '... and so she stays.

She rubs her temples agitatedly. "Oh Gaia... what have we gotten ourselves into?" she murmurs. Gaia is trying her hardest to think of ways to get out of this alive. There have been victors for District 12, and there are indeed victors for District 12 past Haymitch, Katniss, and Peeta... there's _one,_ a sickly boy who has some sort of thing called diabetes - Gaia has no idea really what it is, she just hears the people on the Capitol television talking about their victor's condition - which has him, a man grown now and terrified of shadows in the corner, up in this gilded prison to 'get better', and Gaia knows that she and Colt are screwed without having a mentor.

"I've got nothing to lose..." Gaia whispers to herself, rubbing her arms innocuously.

Strategy. She has to think about strategy... whatever kind she can come up with. She thinks about holding a knife, that might do some good, but she's not so certain she'll be able to just go gunning for the District 1 or 2 Careers and skewer them with some skinny blade lest they turn the blade back on her. That... that _might_ happen and Gaia doesn't - _isn't,_ her mind corrects itself - want to be some sort of easy kill.

Orders. She's been in an orphanage with her brother for the last five years, and the way the dormitory monitors and orphanage owners look down at her, glowering from their rimmed glasses and hawk-like noses, barking orders in languages she does not understand... but she comes to terms with it, she's an order follower and perhaps following orders will just save her puny life. She wants to live, but she has to commit to wanting to live, and Gaia hasn't dedicated herself to something this arduous in a long time, if _ever._

Colt looks like a great ally, the way she's caught him staring at her, not out of romantic feelings or anything creepy, but out of sympathy, a sympathy she appreciates, because Gaia has to recognize in herself, which she does, that this isn't going to happen all on her own, getting out of the arena and she'll need someone by her side. Colt Sheppard, her district partner, who looks like he could snap her neck in three seconds, is a perfect choice!

Gaia thinks back just a few hours ago to when they are sitting with the escort on the train looking at the reapings, and District 7 is the first one to cause Gaia to sit up and take notice. The way the female who volunteers, and Gaia is unable to quite catch her name, at the way she looks, weak, dejected, even dying, if Gaia is to be so bold puts a tiny bit of inspiration in her. How the girl struggles to stand on stage as confident as she can, clearly saving the girl's life she volunteered for, and that's what Gaia sees. Even though this unknown tribute has an evident ailment - _"Why is she bald?" Gaia asks to Colt, who shrugs_ \- despite not knowing what it is, there's an edge in the girl's eyes, a reflection of bravery, strength, a quality Gaia does not possess.

She wants to possess that... and perhaps this District 7 girl could be her one way ticket to learning it. Alongside Colt, hell, she might have a winning strategy.

She takes another look around the room she is in, laminated gray walls surrounding her on all sides, the gown she is wearing going to about mid-knee, the tiled floor the same color. The smell still pervades the room, that sickly sweetness that has her gagging on the aroma, a far too strong delicacy that she has never experienced. She brings a strand of her hair closer to her face, dark and luscious long locks of abyss black, and inhales, the smell from her hair being even stronger than the spray that taints the walls of the room.

Gaia swallows down her disgust. She's never been in the Capitol, she'd never really want to be here in the first place, but now she has to deal with it, and she has to deal with these artificial smells and sounds and absolute grossness... everything she is looking at is like a beautiful white sheet, a white sheet covered in a much lighter scent of perfume, with lacing at the edges. Removing the sheet reveals a stinking, horrid mass of filth, dung, and other decrepit items.

Under the veil, that is where the truth can be found.

Gaia wonders.

If someone removed her veil, what would they see?

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

If anything so far in the day has upset her most, it is the fact that her stylist won't let her keep her hair up in a braid. Her blonde hair is long and flowing down her back, to about where everyone's spine dents in the center, and seventeen year-old Valencia Shale feels like the whole world is telling her, in this very instance, how to act, and that is not something she is going to take to kindly to doing. She is currently standing at the front of the tribute line of chariots, the smell of horse overpowering every other sense she can think about, looking down at the outfit designed for her in mind.

It is quite breathtaking, Valencia will give it that, the scene in front of her at the head of the line, as well as her outfit. Since her volunteer status is confirmed months in advance, Kevia notifies the current stylist about her measurements, and what comes from it is absolutely gorgeous. She is clad in what perhaps resembles a wedding dress, but in each spot of emptiness is a jewel, that if she spins around in should she think about ever letting go, is an unbelievable wake of ruby red, illuminating cerulean sapphire, gorgeous emerald green, bright and glimmering pearl, and viciously stunning diamond, Valencia a whirlwind of precious stones and minerals.

She runs a hand through her hair, sighing, trying not to think about the smell of the horses.

" _I suppose I could entertain their fantasies just this once..._ " she tells herself, yawning. " _But then, in the Games, they'll be entertaining MY fantasy._ "

The odd thing about her wedding dress is that it stops at her shoulders, revealing a nice, jagged scar down the side of it when Valencia falls off of the training rock wall at the Academy and skids a good couple of feet into the fire making station, the Academy designed as best to memory by the other victors to look like the Training Center in the Capitol. The stick she collides with is a very good friend of hers now, creating this jaggedness to it. Valencia is surprised that the wedding dress isn't as revealing as she assumed they would've made it, despite her saying so of not wanting to come across as some sex item. However, with her rather muscular bulk, and not all too tall height, despite the flowing blonde hair and bluish-gray eyes, she hasn't gotten too many suitors knocking at her door step, which Valencia is grateful for.

Just one, she swears.

She can roll her eyes and tell anyone, which she is pleased to do whenever given the opportunity, that she can recall any of the past District 1 females who try getting by on sleaze or sex appeal, because everyone else in the Hunger Games must be weak-willed. It is a tried and unfortunately, _not_ true statement, as if this sexy appeal is some sort of always winning strategy, every victor ever would be the female Career from District 1.

Valencia wants to move past all that. She's much more than a dangling carrot in front of another District 2 Career male she has to fight over to finally get to the victor spot. There's way more to her than she is ever going to get to show by simply letting everything from the neck down show to the open world.

Movement to her left helps distract her from the smell, her district partner, Marcus walking up to her, alongside another male that she doesn't recognize, but someone she does find quite handsome.

"Well, the outfit is definitely interesting..." Marcus smirks, keeping one hand on his hip. He is dressed in all gray, from his dress pants to his vest and jacket and suit and everything about him is lusciously exquisite, the groom to Valencia, a bride and groom play. The fanciness comes into the outfit via his hat that he is wearing, a line of pearls lining the outer room. Besides his appearance, however, Valencia does not think there's much to it.

"Not all that much to show," she says modestly, bringing a hand to lift up the dress some, trying to not think about how the fact there isn't much _form_ at the chest level. When she looks at District 2, with the other girl, Persephone, and the way there is an absolute explosion of cloth and cleavage, a combination Valencia does not expect, and it is hard to catch her off guard, even her confidence can wilt.

Marcus moves the guy who is standing a bit nervously behind him up some, Valencia noticing that his hand goes on his rear-end, which causes the other guy to flush a bright red in the face. "I'd like you to meet someone."

The guy, who Valencia again finds absolutely handsome, and even endearing if she wants to go that far, skittishly smiles, extending a hand. "Milor. Milor Drusus."

"Valencia Shale," she extends the greeting, shaking his hand warmly. This is no ploy, this is no strategy she is devising in her head at the drop of a hat. She is genuinely happy to meet him, someone who seems to stumble over themselves quite easily. It'll be easy enough for Valencia to shove a knife in his chest and out through his back when it comes down to it, but for the time being, she'll enjoy his company.

"District 2," Milor adds.

Perhaps not in the intelligence department though, Valencia will admit. She configures that when she looks over at their chariot and he is talking with that Persephone girl with the big breasts. Valencia has no other way to describe her, shamefully. She gives him another look over, a small smile tugging at the edge of her lips. The gears in her head turn, cogs that jut into place and rut against the fabrics of machinery. _Perhaps he can be useful..._

Valencia wants to redesign the Careers from the bottom up, so girls are no longer sociopathic sex hotspots, or that these males are just egregious brutes who cannot even write their own name. Is that ambitious? Sure. Guess what else is ambitious, which is usually her line after getting scoffed at for her dream? Winning the Hunger Games, and that is something Valencia Shale can achieve.

Milor blushes a bit, looking back at Marcus, then back to Valencia. "Well, I think we're starting now, so I am going to go join Persephone. Let's make sure we can all talk, District 4 as well, before tomorrow morning."

Marcus nods. "Will do, buddy," and even as Milor turns to go on his way, Marcus slaps him on the rear-end again.

Valencia furrows her brow, not quite understanding why her district partner is grinning from ear-to-ear as if he _has_ won the Games already. When Milor returns to his chariot, Persephone, who had been scrutinizing the flowers on the outlining of the chariot, turns to him and is clearly laughing about something at him, and it has to be that he's red in the face.

"Why'd you keep hitting him like that?" she frowns. Efficiency is what Valencia likes to call herself. Making someone feel humiliated in front of others is nothing short of cruel... not efficient.

"Like what?" _Oh, he is not going to get to play the innocent card._

"On the butt, Marcus," Valencia gives him a _not-impressed_ look.

Her district partner sighs, rubbing a hand down his face. "I do not think there's anything wrong with messing around," he shrugs his shoulders, looking back over at District 2, Milor and Persephone staring to get settled into their positions, "Besides, you can smell it on him. That he's queer."

"And there's nothing wrong with that."

"No, there isn't," Marcus agrees, tone light, "But there isn't anything wrong with me having just a bit of fun while I am it."

"Just... don't overdo it," she instructs, and Marcus makes a face in response.

Valencia doesn't say anything to that, instead getting into her own position at the same time, ignoring Marcus for the time being. However, when she brings her eyes to his, as they are the ones leading the cavalry charge, there's a sting hidden in Valencia's gaze, a venom of distaste hitting the back of her mouth.

 _There's something wrong with you having fun. You're cruel about it. I don't do cruel, Marcus. I will gladly kill you for it._

 _Under the veil, you're nothing but a fake._

Valencia shakes her blonde hair again, an unwanted feeling of coolness sliding down her skin. This isn't her... but at least she isn't fake, like her district partner, where she can take the stench off of him like rotting eggs.

She flashes him a smile, Marcus returning it, hands circling together to prove that District 1 is an undying pair, friends and volunteers until the end.

All the while her smile spells out another message, that poor Marcus, with his stupidity that she needs to break the cycle from, is unable to see, unable to read, and unable to even decipher.

 _This will be too easy._

* * *

 ** _Linden Hazel: District 7 Male P.O.V (14)_**

* * *

"I can't do this..." Peri says to him the moment he sees her coming out from the side of the stylist hall, she walking slowly and as if the strength is being sapped out of her by the second.

Linden Hazel, fourteen years-old, and looking as if he has been struck by an angel, leaps off of the chariot, running over to her, steadying her. "You can totally do this, Peri! Don't sell yourself short."

Peri gives a look as if he is crazy, which he very well might be. However, her look changes to that of quick happiness, where just five seconds ago she is talking about being unable to perform and get to where she needs to be. The stylists have done great work on him, which Linden agrees. To say that he himself looks like the metaphor, ' _what the cat dragged in_ ' is far from an understatement, mud and dirt usually caked all throughout his body. Too much time outside, he supposes, with a suppressed grin, staring at gutter rats and trees all day long. His auburn hair is bright and willowy, strands matted down with gel, emerald green eyes popping out behind his for once clean face. He sometimes applies the comparison to that of a fox in good looks.

Homelessness does this to a person.

He has no idea who his father is, let alone where his father is, and even if he's alive. His mother dies when he's eight from sort of stomach bug, and as Linden has no other living relatives besides his mother at such a young age, he is not going to let someone throw him into an orphanage with eighty-thousand other kids - perhaps a bit of a hyperbole on his part, Linden will agree - so the moment the people, a group he hasn't given a better description of, just a nameless group, he bolts. Linden is surprised no one has tried picking him up, but...

He shudders, whilst standing under the pavilion, in the company of all of these horses. He tries not to think about _her,_ a woman standing in the moonlight, only a few years older than his mother when she had passed away, he twelve, and the way her talons caress his face, the way her lips purse, and the way she tries so desperately to get him to unbuckle-

"Hey, Linden," Peri interrupts, jolting him in the elbow, causing him to disrupt from his train of thought. "We should get going..."

Linden shakes his head, turning it into a bleak smile. "I guess we should."

Were anyone to look at the District 7 pair, they'd be described as moving pieces of nature, Peri covered in a floral gown of silk and ivory, with rose petals sewn into the fabric. Atop her head, to help give it a bit of pop, is a crown of roses, something that Linden catches himself staring at. He is dressed a bit more fine in a simple plain white button-down shirt, with perhaps the most handsome pair of pants he's ever seen, he use to wearing rags and scraps of clothing he finds in people's garbage. Several strands of leaves and sashes of ivy are thrown across his shoulders, making a fine pattern of luxury and beauty. In his hands, which he is keeping close and never undoing his fist, is a button that his stylist says to hold onto. Its purpose, he has no idea what it is for, but something magnificent, he supposes. All his stylist tells him is to push the button down using his right hand at the point Pollux Aetos, the Master of Ceremonies, starts talking about the District. Not a second earlier, not a second prior.

As the two situate themselves in the chariot, he on the right, Peri on the left, he takes another look at her. Because of all of his time being spent on the streets, six years come November, if Linden is to be the one who lives throughout all of this - a thought that sends chills down his spine as it even crosses his head space - he is able to say he has a trusting complex, being unable to look someone straight in the eye and say he trusts them. It just isn't possible for him, but...

This is a large one.

Linden looks at his district partner, this Peri Florence, this dealer with something she calls leukemia, that makes her head go bald and her strength to be sapped away from her very core, and something about her makes him trust her, almost quite immediately. This is something that never happens, at least not anymore. He wants to narrow it down to the fact that somewhere Peri reminds him of his mother, but he knows that cannot be it, as the similarities besides being from District 7 do not exist. His mother is currently dying, as Peri so poetically puts it. His mother is never reaped into the Hunger Games - well, _volunteering,_ his mind corrects, but he hardly cares about any of that - and she also isn't currently alive, a thought that puts a sadness in his stomach like a billowing seed.

However, he sees a trait in her that he likes to think he sees in himself, which is strength. Here she is, trying to not succumb to some villainous monster living inside of her, a parasite corrupting every bit of her, and somehow, he knows he wouldn't be able to survive whatever it is she is feeling. Linden knows he cannot fight some devilish creature called cancer, it is not in his genes, it is not in his DNA. He does not want to say, out loud at least, that Peri would be incapable of surviving what he is going through. Homelessness is a different beast altogether, with he learning how to fight for his own food and go after the scraps he feels he deserves, but Linden keeps his mouth shut. With Peri seemingly being his only partner here, he does not want to alienate her or him from the whole process.

A sound of trumpets playing in the background, live or recorded, Linden does not know plays, and all of a sudden the chariot jerks forward. The motion physically causes Peri to stumble, she not having held on to the outer rim of the chariot, horses starting to stir, voices shouting out commands, and the trumpet fanfare getting louder and louder until it swamps over the senses.

"Peri!" he exclaims, reaching down to help her up. Her grasp is a lot stronger than he expects when she returns the favor to reach for his hand, and he hoists her back up to the standing position. He doesn't keep his eyes off of her as she steadies herself, righting the rose crown atop her head. She is perhaps the most beautiful thing he's ever seen, all due to the position of strength. She's far stronger than any Career, and Linden is willing to put his life on that.

Outside, all Linden can see is people. Masses and masses of people, waves of them in chairs and seats and stands all cheering, gawking... Linden feels like he is in a display case. The emotion is quite frightening, all that he can think about however, is that each of these people, all these Capitol citizens, and those back in the Districts, are watching them, people are watching _them,_ he and Peri. Speaking of her, he looks over, trying to drown out the trumpet fanfare in his ears, and he sees that her face has gone paler than the usual color. She is almost translucent.

She collapses again, down into the chariot, trying to hide, and naturally, he goes underneath with her.

"I can't do it…" she repeats to him, looking at Linden through wide, terrified eyes. "Linden, I can't do this. I feel too... I feel too weak."

"You _can_ do this," he insists. "If I can do it, you can too!"

"Linden, I can't!" Peri shouts this, perhaps exerting the rest of her energy out at him that she can.

"You can!" he shouts back at her. "And if you can't do it, then I am going to do it for the both of us!" Linden exclaims.

Holding onto Peri by her left arm, her hoists her back up with him, and then, once she has fully repositioned herself, he takes his hand in hers, holding it way up high for everyone to see. He cannot hear beyond her and the trumpets. He has no idea if Pollux is even saying anything about him, but honestly, it doesn't matter anymore.

His fingers, still holding onto the button in his hand, press downwards.

An explosion of light happens from within both he and Peri's costumes, causing her to jump, but she stays rigid. The crowd goes in an uproar, and over all the noise Linden does hear Pollux shout, "Look at District 7! An unbreakable bond, ladies and gentlemen!"

Linden looks down at his outfit and loses his breath. Inside any of the petals or flowers or leaves that are on his shirt are glowing a lovely and bright halcyon, something inside seemingly buzzing around that creates the light. He looks over at Peri, and all words fail him, her crown a glowing golden piece of brilliance, her dress even now a flashing sign of beauty, and there is pure elation on her face.

A happiness that cannot be ever granted back.

This is a moment he is going to cherish forever.

And Linden is happy most of all, that Peri got to experience it.

* * *

 ** _Carrion Bastion: District 4 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

"This is bullshit!" screams District 4 Career Carrion Bastion, his hands encircling around a coffee mug and then throwing it at the wall. His district partner, Maisey, for all her credit, does not flinch. Instead, she pinches the bridge of her nose, sighing heavily. The rage recedes back into Carrion's bloodstream, his inner anger simmering down, and he goes back up to pick the broken shards of the coffee mug, black and brown liquid pouring down the gorgeous colored walls.

It is dark outside of the windows on their floor, District 4 rather low to the ground compared to say, District 10, but an eerie quiet has actually settled over the Capitol streets. Carrion and Maisey are inside their dormitory, and he is sitting there furious, well _standing_ there, moreso than anything else. Maisey keeps her eyes shut. "Carrion, it is not the end of the world."

"Yes, yes it is," he overrides on top of her statement, clenching and unclenching his fists. "District 7 just outshone all of us and that shouldn't have even been a possibility!"

Carrion goes and makes himself another cup of coffee. He wishes that he could have a shot of vodka or something instead, to help settle the nerves, but the victors for the Careers have kept the liquor away from him only because they know he is going to try and drink it all in one sitting. After all, it is alcohol that got him in this mess in the first place. He goes and takes a seat, rather dejectedly, on the couch in the living room, holding the mug in his hands. There's nothing else his mind is able to think about except the fact that none of the Career districts are the ones being talked about. At first, it seems that District 1, with Valencia and Marcus's beautiful outfits would immediately steal the scene, as per usual, but then he takes a great look down at District 7, with the 'cancer' survivor, and all he sees is blinding red rage.

He knows that he could've been a better contribution to the winning factor if he isn't always so drunk all the time.

"I hate coffee..." he mutters into the mug.

Maisey, who seems to be more exhausted about _Carrion,_ then anything else currently in her life, gives him a look. Words are not able to describe this look that she gives, but it is a pointed one nonetheless. "Then why are you drinking it?"

"There's nothing else."

"There's always water," she gets up from her seat, lounging around and not seeming as uptight as poor Mr. Bastion.

"Water is even worse."

"You say that now. No one is going to give us vodka in the arena. It'll be your ass dying or a cup of water; you'll be begging for a sip."

"I'd rather die," Carrion lifts the mug to his lips.

"You're ridiculous," Maisey rolls her eyes.

"Says the girl who thinks that she is going to win the Games over the rest of us. That's gonna be me, sweetheart," Carrion grins at her.

"Do not call me a sweetheart,"

"Why?" he smirks. "It irritate you?"

"It makes me seem patronized..." Maisey runs a hand through her hair.

Carrion clenches the coffee mug in his left hand, wanting to chuck it at the wall, but something holds him back. He needs to try to move on from District 7 succeeding in the tribute parade. Both of those suckers look like they aren't even going to score higher than a five, and all Carrion needs is to make sure he beats them; it is a task that sounds a lot easier than probably what is going to happen, but he likes to be optimistic.

He isn't the chosen volunteer for District 4. What is supposed to happen, and similar to Maisey which makes all of this actually seem coincidental of all things, is someone is reaped, and the eighteen year-old that takes their place is to jog right up the steps, for being so close, and Carrion's mind makes that an impossibility. Actually still in the stupor of last night's total drunkenness, he raises his hand up high before the other guy, which is a name he completely forgot, and screams out that he wishes to volunteer. It is what he does, and he marches himself to the stage admit all the protest, but since Carrion is on stage now and no one else is, the rest caught in the shaw of confusion and disbelief, it is official.

He shakes Maisey's hand, neither tribute supposed to actually be representing District 4, and then he promptly faceplants onto the stage and passes out.

When Carrion comes to, on the train ride, with Maisey standing over him, curious if poking him in the ribs will wake him up or not - which, in fact, is why he wakes up - he awakes with a sweat. Clammy hands, head hurting with a constant drumming deep down in his soul, and everything shatters. He clamors to the window, wondering if anyone will notice if he jumps off and tries running home.

There were so many parties he is invited to go by friends and other people, namely District 4 teenagers who turned eighteen and have survived their last reaping, but now Carrion is stuck in for the long haul, unable to go anywhere, unable to move himself in a position of power... and he has to deal with this. Trained? Yes. Very good at it? No.

However, once this thought settles over him, Carrion smiles to himself, the anger and upsetedness going back into the blue of his bloodstream. The world is his oyster, the world is what he makes it, and that is good enough for him. All he has to do is win the Hunger Games, and then he'll be invited to _every_ party in District 4.

Maisey sits down on the couch opposite of him, tucking her legs underneath her lithe frame. She yawns, and Carrion's nostrils flare. _How dare she yawn in my presence._

"So," she says, drawling out the sentence, running one hand down her leg, "What do you think of the rest of them?"

"Of who?" Carrion says. This is one of the first nights in a long while, a long, _long_ while where he can tell what time it is, that he's sober, to be able to even think remotely clearly.

"The rest of the Careers, silly." Maisey's tone is playful, accommodating, and all Carrion can wonder is how this airhead of a human being has lasted this long and survived all of these things... surely she is not going to win the Hunger Games.

"Fine, I guess," Carrion shrugs. "We're going to kill them all anyways..."

"I like how you think," she smiles back at him.

"Valencia seems the most collected, but I think she's..." he struggles for the word. "Stand offish. Persephone looks like she has no clue what she's doing, and Marcus isn't better; too arrogant," Carrion places a hand against his stomach, the other extended outwards, "I know my reach and what I am good at, unlike him. Milor seems skittish." He has another thought in his head, but he doesn't say it. "What about you?"

"Valencia looks like a bitch," Maisey flat out says it, and he has to burst out laughing at her bluntness, which is perfect, purely _perfect._ "Persephone is a stupid whore," Carrion notes how often she says it, but laughs either way. "Marcus doesn't seem capable... and Milor, like you said, skittish."

"He's cute..." Carrion blurts out right after her, and then immediately regrets it.

Maisey raises an eyebrow. "Cute? I didn't know you were into men, Carrion."

He scratches the back of his head. "Just a uh... just an itch..." and he is swearing to the highest heaven inside his skull. Ever since he had been around the other guys in the Career Academy, all training to be the best, all sweating and showing off their muscles, and being in-general assholes that he deals with, Carrion starts to see both guys and girls as possible interests, but he doesn't break the mold.

His district partner shakes her head. "Shame you find him cute. He's going to be dying anyways, right?"

Carrion's soul saddens at that, but it is the truth, which he shakes his head in agreement, before bursting out laughing. "This Career pack sucks so badly, we might as well just forfeit now while we're ahead!"

Both he and Maisey cackle their brains out, extending their hands towards the ceiling fans and lanterns to embrace the halos of light and dust.

Under the veil, anyone can be a victim.

Under the veil, anyone can be a murderer.

Carrion Bastion cannot wait to be _both._

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, my first successful update of Sheep Led to Slaughter in the midst of my college / university days, and all because I had the free time from not studying or needing to go out. So, in this chapter we've met Gaia Whisp (D12 F), Valencia Shale (D1 F), Linden Hazel (D7 M), and Carrion Bastion (D4 M), and boy wasn't it fun getting to write new sections to stories that I've never gotten the chance to do before, so thank you all for being amazing reviewers and tribute creators for getting me over the hump that is that stage for SYOTS, as since we've reached this point, I am not going to stop.**

 **What did you all think about these characters, and how do they stack up towards the rest of the tribute cast we've met so far? Next chapter, whenever that will be, perhaps the end of this week, more than likely middle of next week (you know me, I post like a crazy madman ahead of schedule it seems), Chapter #13: A Caged Bird, is going back to the Capitol storyline and we're picking back up where I left off with Hale, Arizona, Rennie, Lewlyn, Calhoun and the gang, which is going to be so exciting, I can barely keep it all in.**

 **Please review, you guys, it'd mean the world to me, and I hope for all of those who are back in school like I am that things all go well. See you all soon! Love you all! Have a great day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	13. A Caged Bird (Capitol Plot I)

**Hey guys, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #13: A Caged Bird, where finally,** ** _finally,_** **we get back to the Capitol characters and the storyline that follows them. I know, guys, that these tributes are awesome and stuff, but these nine are the OG's, right? The real reason why everyone is here, of course... I think? I dunno. Anyways, all I know is that I am excited. Last chapter was the tribute parade, and we met Gaia Whisp (D12 F), Valencia Shale (D1 F), Linden Hazel (D7 M), and Carrion Bastion (D4 M). These Capitol chapters focusing on these storylines will be definitely less word count wise than the tribute focused chapters, but expect at least 4k minimum for all of these chapters regardless of who they focus on from here on out. Enjoy Chapter #13: A Caged Bird.**

* * *

 ** _President of Panem Calhoun Rodney P.O.V_**

* * *

The enjoyment of the night settles down on his shoulders, while he breathes in the anxieties of an oncoming tomorrow. Life, however, is good, he thinks, while standing on the balcony of the presidential mansion. Looking out from his high peak is a city skyline of beauty, with lights of all colors bursting into the sky, a pitch black abyss of wonder that sucks up everything lovely and turns it into invisible matter. President Calhoun Rodney spots musical notes in the sky, from the way the wind blows about and chimes in the background, all music to his ears.

He's watched over the reaping tapes several times in the last few hours after saying hello to the tributes atop his own pedestals. Calhoun notices the glares, the way they look at him with disdain, with evil, and part of it is deserved, he understands that, part of it not so much. He clenches his fist, grinds his teeth, and a brief spite of rage burns in his veins. He is unable to wholly change the future the way he wants to, by simply eradicating the Games. Not every single soul in the world, not every single soul in the Districts hates them, and even District 12 has people who enjoy the Games but aren't brave enough to try.

" _Or too stupid to..."_ Calhoun thinks, shaking his head.

All he knows is, should he try and remove the Games from one year, there'll be an uprising. While the Districts seem to be able to satiate themselves with that, where even the Careers are not going to be clamoring over each other for his throat, the Capitol citizens are enough to make the motions difficult. Though it has only been a hundred years - a thought that hits Calhoun like a ton of bricks - the Games have been able to sink themselves in to the Capitol's world like a beetle ripping their prey apart with their pincers. He can recall, as a teenager, before the collapse of the entire infrastructure, that he wishes the Careers could all die grisly deaths, cheering the others on when one of them would win. He looks back at him skittishly, at his closed door from the outside in.

Lewlyn hasn't arrived yet.

However, it isn't her that has him looking scared.

Despite what Bonnie says, for keeping an arms distance away from the Games, she is the head designer of the mutts. She spends her time looking over these creations that kill and torture tributes for the Capitol's entertainment. She cries when they're destroyed, but yet she also cries when they annihilate and mutilate, and Calhoun is unable to have her pick her poison. He's sensed it in Bonnie that she likes the Games more than she lets on, but he is not going to let that get in the way of his life, and how he runs Panem. He's sure that if he were to eradicate the Games overnight, Bonnie would file for divorce, or maybe even murder him, but he keeps that on the down low.

Calhoun looks back nervously, because Bonnie is inside reading a book in the living room, and he feels as if his thoughts can be projected through the wall.

The sound of a door opening causes the president to jump, and when he turns around, more out of fright than expectance to see who it is, his heart sinks at Lewlyn's mixed face of amusement and disappointment, an interesting combination.

The Head Gamemaker closes the door behind her, keeping her arms crossed, she unmoving. "You wanted to see me, Calhoun?"

He knows well and full that Lewlyn is not exactly his biggest friend, but she gets into the top spot before he does and he does not want the scandal that'll be trying to get her to quit. After all, he's seen what she's done to Rennie, and he is more surprised she hasn't continued it on someone else, especially the president if she hates him as much as she pretends to. This thought breaks something within Calhoun's mind, and he turns his head back towards the Capitol skyline?

Why hasn't he helped Rennie out? It is a look that frightens him in his sleep, a face stuck forever in terror as Rennie's eyes are pleading, sounds escaping his throat, and all Calhoun does is turn his back. The blade goes _snicker-snack_ through the redhead's flesh, a dying scream dissipates in his throat, and scarlet is pouring down his hands. He is the one holding the knife, he is the one swinging it down.

Wait, _no,_ that isn't right. Calhoun brings a hand to his head, cursing under his breath. He is not the one holding the blade. It is the Capitol's head of the Peacekeepers, the one who doles out the punishment. He's worse, though... he's the one who signs it off for it to happen, without ever reading over the warrant. He trusts Lewlyn more than Rennie, who has never told a lie in his life.

Lewlyn frowns, furrowing her brow, seeing that he's distressed. She goes to him, hands on his shoulders, a feeling all too familiar, and Calhoun's body locks up. It isn't Bonnie's hands holding him down to the ground, it is _her,_ it is the devil herself, and his skin is hot like it is being raked over hot coals. "Calhoun? Are you alright?"

He clears his throat, nudging her away, running his hand over the top of the railing, the coolness sliding onto his palm, his flesh leaving smears on the black paint. "I'm fine," he lies through his teeth, something that comes so easily to him. Calhoun looks at Bonnie - _it's Lewlyn,_ his mind corrects - and stays shell-shocked. She's gorgeous, and he's never really, _truly_ seen it. "Bonnie, I-" he starts.

"Bonnie?" Lewlyn raises an eyebrow. "It's me, Calhoun... Lewlyn Davis. Head Gamemaker."

Bright bursts of light flash across Calhoun's face, blood and ash and agony, while there are pincers holding Rennie's tongue, while he laughs with the blade. As Lewlyn's hands caress his shoulders, with Bonnie whispering good nothings into his ears, and during all of this he is dancing under a shower of crimson. Cardinal covers his hands, covers his soul, covers Rennie's face, and Lewlyn's naked body, and everything else is too much of a blur...

"I'm sorry," he apologizes. He rubs the middle of his head gingerly.

Lewlyn takes a step towards him, non-menacingly. "I think the Quell is starting to get to you, more than you think. Even you, Calhoun Rodney, are not invincible," and then she re-crosses her arms. "What was it you wanted to talk about?"

Calhoun blinks the strangeness out of his gaze, clearing his throat. She's here for a reason, and he needs to get it out. The president returns to the railing, taking a deep breath, anxiety sinking into the blue of his bloodstream.

"The Quell twist. Y'know, the one about the tributes voting on each other?"

"Yeah, what about it?" Lewlyn joins him on the railing.

"Don't rig it."

"Excuse me?"

"I'm sure you heard me."

"What do you mean? 'Don't rig it...'" Lewlyn makes a face.

Calhoun rolls his eyes. For all the intelligence that hides in the Head Gamemaker's brain, stupidity is not a trait of hers that comes easily, let alone a trait that usually comes out at all. She is not good at playing dumb, or stupid... she exposes all of her cards too early in a game of poker, and it is quite amusing for Calhoun to watch at how she rages when things begin to collapse after she spends so much time trying to perfect it before she realizes there never had been a chance for perfection in any of her schemes in the first place.

He knows, the moment that Pollux reads the card out loud for the entire country to see, that everyone cheers. It almost guarantees a non-Career victory, as if there are at least four times that the tributes vote, more than likely it'll be the Careers going to die. Not that Calhoun has ever not had favorites, he has a few every year and will bitterly cry along with the families of said tributes that lose their loved ones. He is not, however, going to rig the game.

"Don't play favorites and keep your favorite tribute alive," he revises his statement, saying it with a more hollow tone than he expects, trying to not keep it as pointed.

"Me playing favorites?" Lewlyn scoffs, auburn hair going to the wind. "I don't do that."

"Don't mess with me, Lewlyn, you absolutely do," Calhoun drives the wedge in a bit harder. "Usually it is a Career, and you get them far enough so that it looks like you don't really like them. They don't always win, but you definitely do sabotage it."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"You have an idea how often you say that?" the president changes the course of the topic, making an amused face, keeping one eyebrow piqued above the other. "You say that whenever you know you've been caught. It is very telling." He places one hand back on the railing, keeping the other down at his side. "This year, there can't be any favorites. Don't rig the vote so every tribute votes for someone you don't like just to get them out of the way," she opens her mouth to protest, but Calhoun overrides her anyways. "If a tribute you like gets selected, a Career most likely, let them die." He cannot believe he just said that, but Calhoun knows that he has to make sacrifices.

She purses her lips at him, but she doesn't say anything quite yet, leaning back up against the railing, turning herself around so her elbows and back are resting up against it. "You'd think I'd cheat?"

"I _know_ you'd cheat, Lewlyn," he corrects her.

"There isn't a bone in my body that'd do such a thing."

"You can bullshit with me all you like, but I am not going to believe you."

He rights himself, and another burst of light crosses his vision. More red, more fingers plaiting into his spine, and Rennie's face. He stills. "Lewlyn..."

She juts her jaw out, looking smug. "What?"

"Rennie," Calhoun says, mystification in his voice.

"What about Rennie?"

"I think what we did to him..." he pinches the bridge of his nose. "Was wrong..."

Lewlyn frowns. "Calhoun, I have no idea what you're talking about. You had nothing to do with Rennie's..." she trails off, her brow furrowing in confusion, she frowning.

"Lewlyn?"

She shakes her head, rubbing her shoulders innocuously as if a chill has come over her. "I need to go. I'll see you in the morning, Calhoun," the Head Gamemaker finishes briskly, and she walks back into the mansion, Calhoun standing there in his stupor of confusion, drowning in red hair, red blood, red lies, and his own heart bursting at the pain, while the world spins madly around him.

A caged bird… that is what he is.

* * *

 ** _Master of Ceremonies Pollux Aetos P.O.V_**

* * *

In a heated clash of flesh, he groans as his boyfriend playfully teased his chest with gentle hands. In a muted silence, there's a collected gasp as soft spots were hit with hard forces and vice versa. Emerald eyes matched diamond orbs and passionate kisses distill the longing quiet. Patches of pitch black and pallid white overlap each other as a turmoil of bodies swapped spots on the bed, sounds of moaning echoing off the walls.

Pollux shook his head back, hands on Rennie's hips, he jutting on him at the top, both of their bodies covered in sweat, glistening in the light. He ruts again, Rennie's mouth partly open in exultation, lips forming an 'o' that is so luscious, so delightful, and Pollux is swimming in it. He grinds again, keeping his hands on Rennie's hips, the Avox trying to make sounds, but unable to, the redhead tossing his head back against the pillows.

"You like this?" Pollux grunts, shifting his weight. Rennie nods feverishly, sweat dropping down his forehead, pasting his hair to his head. "Yeah, me too..."

Rennie groans a guttural bellow, one that actually sounds fine, and Pollux sees black and blue and multiple colors of the rainbow, he sighing as he then feels euphoria skyrocket through his veins and through his body. He collapses onto the Avox, feeling the drumming of his heartbeat underneath, wrapping one arm around Rennie's waist, kissing him on the lips.

"Thank you for that..."

Pollux is sure Rennie is trying to say ' _you're welcome_ ', but it only is accentuated by the swallowing of his throat and a slight nod, a gleam in his eyes. Pollux is sure round six will be even better than round five. Rennie throws the covers off, Pollux rolling over onto his side of the bed, whistling low as Rennie, naked, walks over to the other side of the bedroom, staring out at the Capitol skyline. It is really so Rennie can go over and get his tablet so they can converse, but it does give Pollux a nice view of Smith and Wesson in the nether regions. When Rennie turns back around, Pollux feels his face flush scarlet, lips watering... round six needs to happen _now._

The redhead types away - carpets match the drapes, Pollux notes, with a twisted grin - and the message pops up on Pollux's TV in the corner. _That was great._

"Glad you thought so. I try my hardest."

 _Not trying hard enough..._

Pollux smirks. The bastard is daring him, isn't he?

He is surprised when he gets the knock a little over three hours ago, the sky starting to turn black, he just having removed the bowtie from his suit, cufflinks tossed to the floor like marbles that bounce around. As he steps into the bathroom, tile underneath his feet, the knocking sound comes from the doorway, and Pollux walks over. The loss of words that happens for him, something that _never_ happens to the Master of Ceremonies, is almost comical by Rennie's smile that dares to show itself at the edges of his mouth.

Pollux is more surprised at his lack of control as he immediately latches on with a kiss, pulling Rennie inside and slamming the door shut. Thanks to the Avox's amazing tongue, he is able to undress. Now, three hours later, where surely Lewlyn is losing her mind, the Master of Ceremonies is screwing the Head Gamemaker's brother simply because he walked himself to the man's doorstep.

"Lewlyn told me no," he says, putting an arm underneath his head, scooting up somewhat on the bed. He lets out a sigh. "When we spoke earlier today. She told me that I couldn't go out with you, yet you showed up anyway. What changed her mind?"

Rennie goes back to answering. _I don't know. She came back from a meeting with Calhoun and said I had the night off. She told me I could stay here if I wanted to._

A smile creeps itself onto Pollux's face. "I dunno about that, Rennie. I might not ever let you leave then, if that was the case..."

He lets out a shaky breath, chills sliding up and down his spine, snapping bones into place while his heart rate accelerates, eyes widen, and there are stars on the ceiling mixed in with the rest of the white. Pollux tilts his head some, looking at Rennie, who has set the tablet down, going back up to the glass and looking out of it again. He presses his fingers up against it, normally an action that burns in Pollux's veins should someone else just touch his windows, due to the marks they'll leave, but with Rennie, it is nearly gorgeous. He's been inside Lewlyn's home where usually Rennie is forced to stay in due to being her Avox, and for an odd reason, Lewlyn does not have many windows, and neither does her office on the presidential street.

Pollux lives a few blocks down from the training center, which means Rennie is closer to freedom than anyone else in the city if he truly wants to be. Rennie probably only gets to see the night life of the Capitol now once a week, if even that, and putting this in the frame of the mind, Pollux's heart grows three times its size, and his innocence is affable.

"I love you," Pollux says, keeping a dreamy smile on his face.

Rennie looks back at him, a moment stuck in time, a stasis of amber, a perfect, captured frame of innocence and beauty and love, and he has never seen something more beautiful. The Avox picks the tablet back up, typing away. _You do?_

"I do," the other guy agrees. "You're sweet, you're kind, you're..." Pollux sighs. "I love everything about you." It is the first date and he is already saying that. He knows it might be quick, but it honestly doesn't matter. "And it upsets me so much how Lewlyn has done all of this to you and she's had no repercussions."

The redhead looks down, staying silent, but the mutual feeling is there. Pollux can only imagine what shame, what betrayal, what _anger_ that must flood his emotions whenever these thoughts happen, whenever this occurs to him. He lies back down, head swimming with thoughts. The things he wants to do to Lewlyn make his blood boil, but they drive the excitement up, they drive the adrenaline up in his veins and make him feel alive. The world is his oyster and he is going to destroy Lewlyn Davis, Head Gamemaker, even if it kills him.

To stand in front of Calhoun, to stand in front of his best friend and laugh and laugh at the charge of murder being brought to his attention. _It isn't murder, Calhoun, it's justice. Justice for Rennie._

Pollux gets out of bed, walking in step to Rennie, matching foot movement with his breath, keeping himself in tact while he stares at the redhead's backside, and then he reaches the Avox, running one hand around his front, down to his left pectoral muscle, resting it there and squeezing lightly. Rennie shudders when the other hand drops around to the front, encircling around flesh.

"I am going to kill Lewlyn one day, Rennie," Pollux whispers into Rennie's neck, kissing him and sliding down with the rest of his face till Pollux's hair rests against the Avox's collarbone. "I am going to do it for you. Would you like that?"

A slickness makes Rennie buck forward some, a strange croak of surprise coming from within, but the response is immediately telling. _He very much would like this._ "We should do it right in front of her, then," Pollux nibbles on Rennie's earlobe, pressing him against the glass, so many fingerprints, so many smudges on the perfect glass. It is what the Capitol will see, two men pressed up against the windows against a backdrop of blurred red, of anemic white, of supernovas in the abyss sky. Rennie makes another croak of surprise as Pollux's left hand trails one finger down his side, the right still moving in one continuous motion. "Someone else holds her down, Rennie, while she watches me take you, and her world will fall apart!"

He's hated her for the longest time, as he has watched Rennie from the sidelines, seeing the way she treats him, seeing the way it has allowed itself to go on, this abuse, this _abuse that cannot be tolerated any longer!_ Pollux doesn't notice that he is starting to pick up his own pace, his teeth leaving marks in Rennie's skin, the poor redhead crying out in pain, but all Pollux can see is Lewlyn through the reflection of the glass, her face twisted, her face broken and bloodied and matted, all because he has taken matters into his own hands.

"And when I am done with you, we're going to execute her together, Rennie," Pollux screams, and his wrist flicks once more, Rennie buckling under the Master of Ceremonies grip, he actually slipping away and back onto the floor, now covered in a new pool of sweat. Blood is starting to slowly trickle from the bite on his neck, but Pollux is too lost in the thaw to really notice it.

He backs away, throwing his head back, as it looks like round six is about to begin, when Rennie stands up shakily, as if he doesn't even notice the blood anymore, and picks the tablet up.

All Pollux can think about right now in this moment is that this beautiful creature of a man, a gilded baby of delight, is his, all his, and there's nothing Lewlyn, or Calhoun, or anyone can do about it. Rennie clutches the tablet, wincing now from the stinging of the cut, fingers going away at the keys. Pollux can sense it deep down, that this man of his, his lover, the redhead angel from above is no longer going to be a pawn in someone's game anymore, that he is no longer going to become a caged bird for the masses to stare at, for the masses to gawk at and make fun of... he is going to become a player.

The Master of Ceremonies' grin widens even larger than he has before, the libido rocking straight up to the nth degree.

Rennie's response to Pollux's question is in a white font on the black background of the screen.

 _I'd love to._

 _Let's do it._

* * *

 **Well... ladies and gentlemen, there we are, Chapter #13: A Caged Bird, and hot damn I am glad I wrote this in one sitting over the last three and a half hours, as that was fun. So... it seems that Calhoun is mixing memories, something has stirred down in Lewlyn, looks like Pollux and Rennie indeed have hooked up - felt fun to push the boundaries just a bit with the T rating - and... it looks like a few of our characters might be getting bludgeoned with the insanity club right about now.**

 **So, relationship wise we have Calhoun x Bonnie, clearly Rennie x Pollux, unfortunately there's Lewlyn x Rennie, then Arizona x Hale, saw a reviewer say Linden x Peri (which I don't totally disagree with), and our good ole' Santiago say Milor x Carrion, which is indeed funny and something I probably _want_ to support. Which do you guys like the most? What do you guys think will happen next with the Capitol storyline? Interested to find out!**

 **The next chapter, Chapter #14: Mind Torn in Two, is going to focus on four more tributes we haven't met yet and a bit of their background, around the same 5k-6k I reached with the last couple, and then Chapter #15: A Pit of Vipers will go back to the Capitol storyline, and I might be bouncing back and forth to each one of them, similar to LongingForRomeo's (who created Rochelle and Caiden, by the way, guys) own Capitol character storyline in their SYOT (which you should absolutely check out, as one of my own tributes, Jerry Kapper is in it), but there's some exceptions for it as well. I hope you guys do review, I will greatly appreciate it, and I cannot wait to have you all back with Chapter #14: Mind Torn in Two. Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	14. Mind Torn in Two (Intros VI)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #14: Mind Torn in Two, where we get to meet another four tributes on the Hunger Games warpath, something I am very excited about. Last chapter, Calhoun brought some issues forward to Lewlyn about the problems with this Quarter Quell twist, and it looks like there is something brewing in the midst with Rennie and Pollux a la concerning our Head Gamemaker? Things be a-brewing, ladies and gents. Training Day 1 is nigh upon our tributes, so I hope you all enjoy Chapter #14: Mind Torn in Two.**

* * *

 ** _Victoria Armstrong: District 10 Female P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

"Good morning, Hero," Victoria greets cheerfully, waving at her district partner as she lounges out of her room, dressed finely in the training outfit laid out to them by their Avoxes earlier in the morning. Hero is sitting at the counter, hands fidgeting back and forth with a cup of water that he has been drinking for a while, he looking over at her with the sound of her voice. He gives her a small smile, a small gesture loaded with emotion.

"Morning, Tori," he says back, a bit of his light lacking.

She frowns, sitting up at the counter with him, nodding at the Avox who gives her a plate of eggs, they bowing wordlessly before disappearing off into the wild of the rest of the floor. Arizona and Hector Merviere, their victors, weren't up yet, which Victoria finds quite humorous actually, given that they need them to sort of, well, _help_ in winning the Games.

Victoria looks at Hero, her heart pumping in her chest, blood roaring in her ears, and disappointment flowing in her veins. She's seen the way he looks at her, with wide eyes and a sweet smile, gentle hands against her arms and a playfulness in their mock fights, but she is unable to feel the same way… she is unable to look past that this might be her brother here, and now that he's volunteered himself, because she's reaped, there's no way she could ever dream of bridging a relationship between them now. Maybe months and months ago, when they're much younger, perhaps, but she's not so sure now. _She_ wants to go home. She isn't quite so sure if Hero wants her to go home too, or if he'll be selfish and want himself to go back to District 10 instead.

She finds Hero to be her brother more than anything else, out of everyone else in the world, simply because she's an only child. The way her mother sobs, when it should be Victoria as the one crying, that her mother is going to lose her only child and it is the fifteen year-old who has to step up and be the adult. Victoria places one hand up against her mom's face, cold fingers touching an even colder cheek, and she places their foreheads together.

 _"I can do this, Mom. I know I can. Sure, I might not be as strong or as trained as a Career from 1, 2, or 4, but I can do this. Besides, I have Hero…"_

 _"Can you trust Hero?" her mother asks, looking at the corners skittishly as if her newly found district partner is going to pop out at the walls._

 _"I think I can trust him. He volunteered to be here with me, after all…"_

 _Her mother wraps one bony hand around Victoria's other hand, the one by her side, placing it back onto her daughter's chest. Victoria can feel her heartbeat under her skin, under the clothing, the way her breath matches in tandem, in rhythm, and it is beautiful. It is glorious. "Listen to that, Victoria. That's your heartbeat. You have to keep fighting to make sure that keeps pumping," a pause, on her mother's end, while Victoria closes her eyes, the drumming calming to her anxious soul. "Do you think you can do it, Victoria? Coming home over Hero?"_

 _She nods. "Anything to stay alive, right?"_

 _"Right."_

Hero nudges her out of her thoughts, Victoria breaking off. When she looks at him, her heart does skip a beat, but not because she finds him drop dead gorgeous or anything like that – she cannot lie and say Hero isn't somewhat attractive – but because it means that eventually, she is going to have to betray him, to betray the trust they've had together for so many years. Neither Arizona or Hector have sat down with them and have had the talk about only one of them making it back alive when they were to volunteer for the 103rd Hunger Games, instead ruining it by having her reaped, which is a nagging thought in the back of her mind. Perhaps it isn't just mere chance that the reaping bowl draws her name for a Quarter Quell… and Victoria's heart is immediately saddened, but she doesn't say anything. It is her turn to make a downcast face, which Hero notices.

He frowns, resting one hand on her shoulder. "Hey, you okay?"

She looks at him in the eyes, causing him to jolt. Her eyes, whenever she starts to get sad, whenever she starts to get upset, they begin to shine brighter than usual, illustrious emeralds in a haze of white, in a sea of nothingness, where all is revealed to her. "Yeah… I just- I just had a thought."

"Does it pertain to today?" Hero asks.

"Not particularly."

"Then maybe we should focus on something else," he suggests. "It's the first day of training, remember?"

She completely forgets this when she wakes up, wondering why there's this random outfit on her bed when she wakes up, a pretty two piece black and gray outfit with long sleeves, her number emblazoned in red on the back, and it fits her pretty snug. They, however, do have a plan, an idea that her mind brings to light, causing Victoria to smile. It is an easy one, however, but it is also possible enough that it could get them both killed if they aren't careful and Victoria Armstrong is not planning on dying right out of the gate. She prefers to not die at all, of course, but she knows the odds, in the back of her mind, the odds are always there.

"We impress the Careers and hope they pick us."

"We'd be some pretty young Careers," Hero whistles.

"Finnick Odair was younger," Victoria shrugs.

"Neither one of us are like Finnick Odair, Tori," he points out, and then even admitting it, his face blanches.

A seed of worry digs itself into her skin, but Victoria knows that Hero is right. They aren't anything like these ole Careers and yet they're trying away. It is her ambition, the part of her that wants to build higher and higher and higher even knowing that when people tried reaching God with the Tower of Babel, God dispelled them to the great beyond with the language dispersement. Victoria is sure that if she tries climbing the ladder to ascertain some sort of Hunger Games excellence, the gods of the Games, the Gamemakers and President Calhoun at that will shoot her down with lightning bolts, that the part of the world she is trying to reach is not for her and it never will be.

She locks her jaw, nodding. "You're right. We aren't," she knocks Hero in the shoulder lightly. "Doesn't mean we can't certainly not try. The worse thing that happens is that we end up not impressing the Careers and we end up making fools of ourselves."

"No," he deadpans back at her. "The worst thing that could happen is that they decide to kill us if they see us a threat. You think the two of us can combat all six?"

"I can't see that," she admits honestly. "However, if it was us two versus one or two of them at a time, perhaps, I could see that." Victoria straightens her back. For some reason, and she wants to know why, but is too afraid to ask, usually it is Hero giving her the rallying speeches and she trying to calm him down, to correct him with the truth, but now the roles are reversed. He is reaching for stars that aren't there, and she's bringing him back to Earth, back to Panem, back to their apartment, because that is all that matters, that they remain humble, that they remain with their old selves long enough to realize when the future rips them away from the past. "The worst that can happen is rejection."

"The worst that can happen is _death_ ," Hero says wisely, drinking the rest of his water, putting the glass in the sink. It is so eerily quiet on the floor, with no one being up, it seems, besides the two of them.

Victoria gets off of the stool, going back to her room, looking at it. Part of her doesn't want to go down to the training floor, as all training is, besides learning what you _aren't_ good at is a period of time where everyone tries sizing the others up, failing miserably, and already having shot your confidence of winning.

She closes her bedroom door behind her, keeping her arms crossed.

However, this is not the plan she has in mind for herself. There could be a presumable victory in mind on the horizon, she is unable to fully count herself out, but she is ready to put forth the effort to make sure she gets out alive.

When Hero sees the change in confidence in her, he sits up straighter.

"C'mon Hero," Victoria smirks. "We've got some Careers to impress."

* * *

 ** _Edwin Bishop: District 5 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

He has no idea exactly why his district partner is so messed up in the head, just from the way he observes how she goes about doing her 'thing', but all fifteen year-old Edwin Bishop knows is that she is not going to be much help in the arena more than likely. He's sat in the back, in the invisible shadows, training one eye on her, on Annabellina, while tending to himself, licking his wounds, and crying in his sleep.

Of all the cruel jokes the world could play on him, getting picked for the Hunger Games is one of them. Life seems good to him, before yesterday morning, where he's on track to become one of the smartest engineers and chemists in the district, better than a majority of the adults already that he knows. He's met Calhoun once, just a year ago, shaking his hand and smiling like the idiot that he is with the most powerful man in Panem. All he has to show for himself, Edwin realizes, is his brain. There isn't much to it, more than likely, that he'll be able to do any physical damage.

Currently, he's standing on the fringes of the outer rim of the training center, where everyone, all twenty-four of them are whacking away at someone, not doing much of anything damage wise, which is quite funny. He and Annabellina are over in a corner, but he's been much more quiet than she has, Annabellina cursing every few seconds when something goes wrong. Currently the two of them are over by the fire making station, something that Edwin finds sort of ridiculous, as he can make a fire out of pretty much anything he can get his hands on – thinking quickly on his feet is his specialty – so he is wasting time just watching Annabellina fail over and over again at starting it.

He wants to go and try grabbing a sword, but then reality hits him, he looking down at his thin limbs and even frailer legs, and knows that is not happening. There is no way, even if he stands there and tries eighty calculations, that he's going to be able to lift the sword up and swing it effectively at something. Effective is the key word here. Edwin Bishop does not try anything or attempt anything if it is going to be ineffective, he doesn't want to die expelling all of his efforts into something that won't help him, it just isn't going to happen.

Annabellina curses again, a slight spark coming from the twigs she has assembled, but then that is that, there's nothing left, and she swats aside the materials. "Screw this!" she snarls.

Edwin rolls his eyes, placing a hand to his forehead, running his palm down the front of his face. "You're doing it wrong, that's why," he steps over to her, leaning down. "Let me help you."

"No!" Annabellina roars this time, causing him to jump. "Abe doesn't need your help!"

He furrows his eyebrows. Who's Abe? _Abe?_ Edwin does not know an Abe, but he sure as hell isn't liking the fact that his consciousness is weighing heavily down on him. Annabellina not learning how to create a fire could kill her, due to the cold, and he is not about to have her death hang over him like a noose in which he can slip through it anytime time he wants.

"It really isn't that hard. You're making it difficult on yourself."

Annabellina's eyes soften. "What do you mean?" Her tone changes completely, the rage in her eyes recedes, and Edwin looks at her with a strange distance between them, he scooting back. It is as if there is a switch inside her mind that could flip any second and absolutely annihilate him. He notes that for later. _She's mentally unstable. Perfect._ "Belle would like to know."

" _Belle?_ " his face contorts into a weird frown. " _Who's Belle? Whatever… doesn't matter…_ " and then Edwin sighs, hands feeling the ground. It is damp to him, the leaves wet and soggy underneath his fingertips. "First problem. You're using wet ground. Fire needs oxygen to breathe, but throwing water on it or using damp materials causes the flame to extinguish," he instructs, sliding over to a more dry patch of ground. He notices the way Annabellina's eyes follow him, but she isn't looking at his hands, or his feet or his body as he moves. She's staring _at him_ , a look that pierces his soul, chills sliding down his spine. The ground he touches is much softer, leaves dry, the sticks and twigs rougher on the hands, which he notes by holding it in his hands. "You need to use dry ground. Have you ever heard of a wildfire?"

Annabellina nods, but he's not so sure which name she might say whether it be Abe, Belle, or someone else... but he knows that _her_ name, the person he is talking to, is named Annabellina Circuit and the girl is going to know what a wildfire is. "Lina likes wildfires," Annabellina says, chuckling. "It is how she came to be, with fire and pain..." a nervous laugh comes from her, and Edwin starts to sweat.

"Well, anyways..." Edwin drawls out, scooting over some more, but Annabellina takes it as an invitation to continue sliding, and he knows immediately that this is not the person for him, this is not what he should be doing. He should be learning about a weapon, since he has never picked up one before. He's never felt the cold iron of a handle to a blade before, or the heaviness of an axe weighing down his palms... Edwin begins to sweat even harder now, thinking about how, just behind him, the Careers are using all sorts of weapons to hack dummies to bits, and eventually they'll train their weapons and their fire on innocent, little meek tributes like him. He shudders at the thought, but then looks at Annabellina who is studying him with a face that is most peculiar. His skin turns to ice... how long has she been staring at him? "So... anyways, with wildfires, they're really common in District 10, for example, because dry leaves and nature and wood is very flammable, and once they start blazing, they usually don't stop." He points back at the old makeshift fire she first created. "With your wet ground, it didn't do anything. Wildfires can continue on for a long time and burn themselves out, in essence, if there isn't any way for them to stop burning, usually when there's no water around."

However, it turns out Annabellina, and as a result, Lina, Abe, and Belle, which Edwin adds mockingly in his thoughts, aren't even listening to him. She's focused on the action behind her. He turns to look, and she's doing as he expected, she's watching the Careers. There's one at the archery station, Edwin is sure his name is Marcus - _damn, he is beautiful,_ he thinks, _lustrous and filled and wow..._ \- but he gets lost in the thought as he watches Marcus load his bow with arrow after arrow, firing at the targets in the dead center and seemingly not missing a beat. Next to him is someone else, Edwin is sure that the Careers' name is Carrion, biceps the size of Edwin's head, lugging spears at targets down the lane with the might of a triceratops – Edwin is pretty sure that simile does not work, but he's going to let it slide as he's too exhausted to try and think of something clever while he is watching them work amazingly at these practice targets – where the sounds echo along the training room. He gulps.

What is a nerd to do?

He shrugs his shoulders, waving his hand in front of Annabellina's face. "Hey, look at me. Annabellina, _focus,_ " he says, his tone getting sterner, in which she snaps her gaze to him, mouth lipped slightly downward in a frown, eyes wide, and it is because there is nervousness racing through her. Edwin can sense it, and practically feel it, the way Annabellina is shaking and tremoring so terribly next to the fires. "Don't pay any attention to them. They're just doing what they always do."

"But they do it so well…" Annabellina whispers.

"That's because they all trained for it," Edwin nods sagely. "They volunteer like idiots and get themselves all killed. I guarantee you all six of them, from Districts 1, 2 and, 4 volunteered." His mind goes back to the reaping, when he is holding Annabellina back from vaulting off of the stage at the Peacekeepers that are drawing her father back… and the way strength resonates in her. He isn't so sure of his angle, but he is even more confused at Annabellina's angle, because it looks like there's a lot more strength in her body than what she admits.

She stands up, he still being confused by every single one of her actions – _God, she is unpredictable,_ his mind complains – keeping himself as quiet as he can however should any of her strength come back and she snap his neck. "I want to do what they're doing. I want to train." Without another word, Annabellina jogs over to Marcus and Carrion, Edwin watching her go, words of protest dying on his lips.

"I don't think that's a good idea Annabellina, I-" but he stops himself, it looking like he isn't enough to stop Annabellina, Abe, Lina, or Belle and whoever else from these decisions. He groans to himself, frustration sinking down into his socks.

He stands, dusting himself off from the Earth of the fire making station. There's nothing else to do, he already knows how to create a fire, and it sure looks like Annabellina isn't going to return for any more of his teachings.

 _"Oh what the hell…_ " his mind throws its hands up in the air, and Edwin gives a slight chuckle. Doesn't matter anymore, he might as well.

Throwing caution to the wind, Edwin Bishop runs after his district partner. It is time he brought himself into the fold.

* * *

 ** _Persephone Castor: District 2 Female P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

Never being one to really ever lie, Persephone Castor is going to admit in full-fledged freedom that she has absolutely no idea what she's doing, but that, however, has been most of the case throughout her entire life. This is a fact she can say and have a good laugh about a bit later. However, and will admit this, she has no idea exactly how she's a tribute in the Hunger Games as Career Academy volunteer. She doesn't have an affinity towards hating violence, and not necessarily an affinity _towards_ violence, but perhaps an indifference that simply ends up with her being discombobulated along the way.

As she stands in the circle of the other tributes, trying to eye each other and weight their weaknesses against her strengths, or rather lack thereof, Persephone notes how young everyone seems. When asked by the head trainer, a woman that Persephone forgets the name of, the common age is fifteen, which is surprising to her, but a lot of seventeen and eighteen year-old's as well, which would include her. Persephone raises her hand, the group is disbursed, and all she can keep thinking about is yesterday on the train ride, with Hale Cornerstone looking at her, the sweet victor she tries to be, making the largest frown she could muster as the poor Career leans herself over the bowl still trying to be 'sexy'.

It takes ten minutes to wash the whip cream from her bra strap. She does this, grumbling to herself at Milor's recent comment at her, the way he tries so hard to keep himself quiet about her body, the way his cheeks burn a bright and furious red out of shame, and that is because little Miss Persephone Castor can see right through the sleazing scumbag this boy tries to pretend to be. She'll dangle his secret over his head till the cows come home, but for the time being, as long as there's nothing else bad blooded between any of them, she's fine with being his friend. After all, they're district partners, they've trained together for years, and one of them is definitely going to become the next victor of the Hunger Games.

She is now standing in front of the knife throwing station, one hand encircled around the bone-handle of the blade she is about to throw, the line lined up nicely. Looking over to the left of her, Milor standing beside her, is Marcus and Carrion, and their performances causes her to swallow. Marcus is practically hitting bulls-eye every time, and then there's Carrion who is throwing his spears so hard at the target, they're flying back against the wall. What is she going to be able to do?

Persephone remembers that eventful day, five years ago, where she's dressed all girly like in frolics and cute uniforms, bows in her hair, long ebony waves down to about mid-back and the sun shining over her chocolate colored skin, when Hale points her down and asks her to come to the stage. Persephone is doing decently in the training, nothing all too effective, nothing all too lethal, but Hale singles her out as is. She becomes her protégé, Milor becoming Ellison's, the old weathered man from before the 3rd Quarter Quell's infamy - and though the normalness of Persephone not knowing where she's heading, there's been an improvement. Not the best improvement to compare herself towards Marcus or Carrion, or even Valencia, as the girl from District 2 watches her fellow female Career combating Maisey in the fighting ring, the two woman dancing in a passionate tango of blades, blood, and hair, she swallows. She might be the weakest one after all.

"Hey," Milor's voice breaks through the silence, beads of sweat starting to trickle down her face. She can do this. It is no different throwing it at a target in the center with Hale standing over her, it is no different and it shouldn't feel any different, but to Persephone, it does. He rests a gentle hand on her shoulder, and she turns her neck back at him, but doesn't look at him. "You can do this, Persephone. Block the rest of them out. They're just trying to prove that they're better than us."

She nods. He's right, Milor Drusus usually ends up being right. Picking up the knife, she steadies herself, turning a bit side-face, then vaulting herself forward, the blade goes flying out of her hand. With precision practicing, which means Hale telling her over and over to throw the damn knife, it careens down the brightly blue lit lane and embeds into the shoulder of the target with a loud _thunk_.

A coo of disappointment rises from her throat. With the other Career males making bulls-eyes... shoulders are not enough.

Persephone turns to give Milor a turn when he stops her. She looks up at him, expecting a sharp retort. "What?"

"What's with the glum face?" he asks.

"I didn't make bulls-eye," she looks back at the target, and then back at Milor. His peppiness in speeches has yet to really rub off on her. Here she is, trying to always perform, trying to always do what everyone else wants her to do, and not what _she_ wants to do. Persephone tries recalling the names of the other prospective Career girls that she's managed to triumph over, but ends up short, because comparison land is not where she wants to be. "I usually do..." Naturally, almost instinctively, her head begins to float back towards the other Careers who are seemingly doing a _much_ better job than her.

Milor presses a hand against her cheek, pushing Persephone's face back towards him. "Don't look at them. It doesn't matter what they're doing. What matters right now is you and I, and those knives, and," he points behind her, "The targets we're throwing at. I'm probably not going to get bulls-eye either. I usually use swords instead."

He steps up to the mat, Persephone falling back behind him. It looks like only the Careers have been using the weapons so far, the girl from District 5 wanting to shoot archery alongside Marcus, but the privileged king of District 1 quite rudely moves her away from his peace and quiet. She turns her head back around, and is surprised to see that not all twenty-four tributes are out around the stations training. Somewhere throughout the process, they've moved on and she hasn't even noticed, Persephone is too caught up in making she makes the target feel the pain of the blade.

However, as her mind scans, she does notice something. Milor is prepping his throw, he fixing his stance, breathing in and out.

She blindly reaches behind her for his shoulder. "Milor..."

"What?" he asks annoyed.

"Look behind you..."

Persephone is staring at the District 10 couple - she uses the term as loosely as she can - remembering their names to be Hero and Victoria, names, to Persephone, that sound very Career-esque. The two tributes from District 10 are standing in the circle of all the training dummies, short daggers in their hands, but moreso a gladius or a dirk in size. A trainer blows the whistle around their neck and the two spring into action. Victoria vaults a good foot or so over the dummy, one blade in her left hand taking its head clean off. Hero tackles his own dummy to the ground, stabbing in its face several times. The girl is back at the circle, ducking underneath arms and diving in between legs while maneuvering her blades in whichever way seems the most fashionable. Hero grabs a dummy's head, and with the twist of his hands, rips it clean off, an exuberant show of strength that Persephone is pretty sure a guy as bulky as Carrion would be even unable to perform. All that power in such a tiny little body fascinates her.

When the damage is done and the dust settles and the carnage is cleared, Hero and Victoria finish their spectacle by swiping the blades behind them to behead the last standing dummies in the ring, the rest a collapsed mess of blue Styrofoam and plastic. Persephone realizes that she's been holding her breath, and when she exhales, quite loudly, it occurs to her that the room is completely silent... everyone left, which is just the Careers, the District 7 pair, and the male from District 12 besides Hero and Victoria, they're all looking at them. The male from District 12 even gives them applause, but Persephone is pretty sure there's a lot more she could give them.

"Did you just see that?" she says.

Milor drops the knife, he had dropped it a long time ago actually, seemingly being the only other one truly impressed. Valencia, over in her corner, rolls her eyes, going back to wiping her hands with more chalk dust. "Yeah... I did. They're ruthless. Bloodthirsty," he shudders.

"I think we're going to need a bit more ruthlessness and bloodthirstiness in the Careers, Milor," Persephone says, turning to him. "Don't you think?"

He picks the blade back up and settles it in its old place. "What do you have in mind?"

Her eyes are sparkling and twinkling, and she's pretty sure that Milor's pretty sure that she's sure that no one but her is going to go along with this idea of hers, this fledgling that has taken flight. "Let's broaden our horizons."

* * *

 ** _Corvus Raynott: District 6 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

There isn't much he thinks he knows, but if there's one thing for certain out there in the world of vast knowledge, his district partner is one gigantic bitch, and Corvus Raynott cannot believe he just swore inside his own mind.

He is standing with Lowelle back in their apartment, he holding in his hands the notebook that he found by snooping in her bedroom after breakfast. Part of him, deep down, through his reflective diamond stare at his pale complexion, feels ashamed, guilty, even remorseful that he's had to go and intrude on her belongings, but it is no secret that he'd love to know who and what he's dealing with here if he is going to try to get out of there alive. Lowelle's face goes completely red when she steps back into the foyer, and he's holding the notebook by one of its pages, it threatening to tear itself away and commit suicide by dive bombing onto the cushions of the couch.

"Gimme that!" she snarls, marching over to him, snatching the notebook out of his hands.

"You think you're so clever, don't you?" he mocks her, keeping an eye on her. He's heard of her, unbelievably, back in District 6. Of this incredibly terrifying sea witch named Lowelle Sable that learns of your worst fears and largest secrets and compiles them into a hitlist. As far as he knows, someone with the name of Lowelle doesn't sound all that scary, and with it being the absolutely furious tribute standing in front of him on the other side of the couch, he isn't all that too intimidated. "Having a game plan in the arena? Newsflash, sweetheart, but agendas change."

It is quite ridiculous, he wants to say to her out loud, but he's pretty sure he's already pissed her off so now it is just riding the wave of damage control. Something about her, the way she carries herself, bothers him. Corvus is able to admit to himself and the rest of the known world that he is easy to get along with, and doesn't usually have trouble making friends even if their friendship is just on the surface level of all things. When he sits on the train, or in the chariot next to Lowelle while they're dressed up like railroad tracks, something that makes Corvus with his tiny, muscular frame, feel like an absolute idiot, there's a certain smell to her, an odor that pervades off of her skin that is similar to curdled milk, to bread with mold, to a dying person from cholera left out to dry in the sun like a dry corn husk.

This Lowelle Sable may think she is so smart by designing game plans and alterations, and alternatives, but she is setting herself up for failure and the girl is too smartly witted to know the difference from self-sabotage, and revenge.

"It's better than winging it," she grumbles.

"You don't seem like the very best person at keeping everything together, though, are you? You can be read like a book, so people will know you're trying to gain their trust just to backstab them," he gesticulates back at the page. "The list of weak tributes to kill... was I on there? Were you going to add me to the list if I wasn't?" He gets as far as reading the headline of it, then she notices and unleashes the second coming of Christ on the apartment. As he begins to talk, Lowelle paces into the kitchen, and Corvus smiles stronger and harder. This means he's getting under her skin, good, _good,_ very good.

Lowelle gets a glass from one of the cabinets, filling it up with water and taking a drink. "God, listening to you talk is insufferable."

"Because I'm right, and I like to figure you're usually never proven wrong," Corvus ganders. Training, earlier in the day, he makes sure to go over and grab a club, dancing with an instructor around a ring of mud, and falling into the mud clearly meant you lost. He's surprised at the fact that the trainer definitely does not put up a weak fight, and yet he is standing over the man triumphant, nearly covered in mud. Lest he hope Lowelle never sees this side of him. "Let me give you some advice. Not everyone here is going to be as foolish or as dumb as you think. It just isn't going to happen. Learn how to actually fight, and maybe I'll consider joining you as allies."

Whatever is contained in that statement must be so hilarious to her, as she pats down the counter and begins laughing her heart out, a laugh so full that Lowelle tilts her head back, hand on her stomach, a cawing crow noise rising from her throat. "You and I as allies? That sounds so funny!"

"It's that or you die in the bloodbath. The Careers don't want bitches in the arena when they're already like that," he wisely points out. He's seen them, he's stood in the shadows and watched the ways that the Careers behave.

Lowelle locks her haw, turning to him, glaring. "You know, Corvus, everything you say is absolutely bullshit."

He feigns an expression of mock pain, lifting his hands up in the air in the form of ' _I surrender_ ', before turning away from her as Lowelle finishes her drink. "Alrighty then, have it your way Lowelle. When you get a one in training because you don't have any physicality to your plan, don't come begging to me to support your ass because I got a higher score."

Corvus makes his way to the elevator, pressing the down arrow as in fact, the training center isn't closed even if training is 'closed' for the day, he can still go down there and spar with more dummies. A sound of rage, most likely coming from Lowelle's throat, emerges from behind him, she picking up her empty water glass and chucking it at him directly.

He isn't looking in the direction of her beeline fast ball when Corvus catches the glass a few inches from his head. She makes a croak of surprise, not expecting that, Corvus locking eyes with her. He crushes the glass in his hands, fingers clenching down, and shards falling to the floor. He cuts himself somewhat on it, blood mingling in, but he doesn't care. Corvus gives Lowelle a sweet smile. "Another thing, sweetheart. Don't provoke me..." the elevator dings open, he stepping in one foot, the other outside, and he sighs exuberantly at her. "Look at you. Your mind is torn in two, isn't it? You've never experienced failure before, have you?" A pause, but before she can say anything, "Don't worry, alongside failure, you'll also get to experience death."

With that, Corvus Raynott steps fully into the elevator, minding the shards of glass everywhere on the ground. The doors shut, and he departs.

Standing back in the kitchen is Lowelle, speechless, and wondering what in the flying _fuck_ just happened.

* * *

 **Well, there we are ladies and gentlemen! That was Chapter #14: Mind Torn in Two, for Sheep Led to Slaughter, our very first day of training, and another four new tributes down. We've met the other half to our Hero, Miss Victoria Armstrong (D10 F), then following that is Annabellina's best side, Edwin Bishop (D5 M), we've met the last of the Career pack with Persephone Castor (D2 F), and it looks like Lowelle might meet her brute strength match in Corvus Raynott (D6 M). So, Romeo, how is Corvus stacking up against my man Jerry? Who would you say wins that fight?**

 **Beyond that, this means there are four more tributes left to meet, which will happen with Chapter #16, because first, we're going to step back into the Capitol scene with Chapter #15: Pit of Vipers. I did some statistical data findings, and with Persephone's comment being half from my curiosity, this was how many tributes per age we had.**

 **18: 6 ~ (Marcus Pharadane, D1 M), (Persephone Castor, D2 F), (Milor Drusus, D2 M), (Carrion Bastion, D4 M), (Blake Hanley, D9 M), (Colt Sheppard, D12 M)**

 **17: 6 ~ (Valencia Shale, D1 F), (Maisey Rovneay, D4 F), (Lowelle Sable, D6 F), (Marissa Herdier, D9 F), (Alexandra Quinn, D11 F), (Caiden Grove, D11 M)**

 **16: 2 ~ (Annabellina Circuit, D5 F), (Peri Florence, D7 F)**

 **15: 6 ~ (Rochelle Pascal, D3 F), (Edwin Bishop, D5 M), (Corvus Raynott, D6 M), (Galiant Rushmohone, D8 M), (Victoria Armstrong, D10 F), (Hero Slade, D10 M)**

 **14: 1 ~ (Linden Hazel, D7 M)**

 **13: 3 ~ (Deacon Fincher, D3 M), (Marina Penweather, D8 F), (Gaia Whisp, D12 F)**

 **12: 0**

 **So, surprisingly, there isn't a single twelve-year-old tribute, Linden is the only fourteen year-old, and the Careers all make up the 18 and 17 year old's, as well as the fact that they're all even numbers of 6's for the 18/17/15 category... just interesting facts that I found. Also, I want to mention, I have created a forum for Sheep Led to Slaughter, and currently I sent all you submitters, all you lovely people, a PM detailing that very fact about joining said forum to become moderators, and to just participate in it, so refer to the PMs I sent you for more details!**

 **So, anyway, digressing too much, we're back to the Capitol storyline with Chapter #15: Pit of Vipers, and then Chapter #16 we'll be meeting the four remaining mystery tributes that are the D3 Male, D8 Female, D9 Female, and D11 Female, which I am very excited about. I hope you guys do review, and I am so excited about all of these evenly laid out published chapters (hoping to do one every three to five days, so try and keep as up to date as you can)! I'll see you all very soon. Love you all! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	15. Pit of Vipers (Capitol Plot II)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with once again another chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #15: Pit of Vipers, which is another chapter focused on the Capitol side of the storyline to view the other characters we didn't get to see with A Caged Bird. Last chapter, #14: Mind Torn in Two, we met another four tributes a la Edwin Bishop (D5 Male), Persephone Castor (D2 Female), Corvus Raynott (D6 Male), and Victoria Armstrong (D10 Female). Chapter 16 will have the last four tributes to meet, but** ** _first,_** **a Capitol storyline check-up. Please do enjoy Chapter #15: Pit of Vipers.**

* * *

 ** _Hale Cornerstone: Victor of the 87th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

Something about couches always makes Hale Cornerstone nervous. Extremely, absolutely, positively without a doubt, nervous. She is unsure whether or not it is the fact that the air around is open, so she is exposed to the elements, chill and fright alike. There is nowhere to hide, unlike behind a brick wall when people are advancing your way, or that the leather - she always finds herself sitting on _leather_ couches in particular - is naturally cold to the touch and that absolutely devastates her, as Hale also dislikes being cold. She is unable to mesh into the couch to stay away from scrutiny, not necessarily meaning there is much for her to hide, but she likes knowing there is something comforting behind her.

In her circumstances, Hale is finding herself stuck in that same situation all over again anyways, she on District 1's floor - just one beneath her own - where they're so low enough that if Hale looks out of the vast amount of windows on their floor, she can see Capitol citizens walking by, gawking at the training center, taking pictures and generally being a nuisance. Lance and Kevia are sitting on the opposite side of the living room on their own couches, the tributes all down a few levels beneath them training as well, which means it gives Hale a moment away from distractions.

She would've invited Arizona, but something stops her from doing so, but she isn't quite so sure exactly _what_ is stopping her, she just doesn't do it. Preferably, Hale wants him with her. When they're in the Capitol on Hunger Games business, it isn't unlikely anymore to be seen together, as there's always eyes watching, but that is all they are: eyes trying to find a loophole to look through and one doesn't exist. Hale bites down on the bottom of her lip, a cup of tea on a small, dainty dish in front of her on the coffee table, but she's yet to pick it up.

In the normal circumstance of victors, she is the lowest on the totem pole between her and Ellison, District 1, and District 4. The Careers have about nine victors in total, most of them hailing from District 1, but the three districts haven't had a triumphant victor since the 87th Hunger Games... and it is the time, once again, to chat about perhaps making sure that these things occur, where a Career tribute comes and wins, as it is going to look very bad on them if the fourth quell comes and goes and a Career isn't the victor tribute.

Hale shudders, squeezing her eyes shut. Finnick Odair technically counts for the 75th Hunger Games, but- she doesn't want to keep thinking about that. Negative thoughts breed negative words, and negative words breed negative actions.

"Hale, honey, what's wrong? You've hardly touched your tea," Kevia admonishes, lifting her own cup up to her mouth and taking a sip, slurping the whole way. The victor from District 2 winces, trying to not show as much displeasure as usual from Kevia's rather astonishing lack of manners, which are pretty much everywhere, rampant in all scenes of conversation.

It is true though, the tea is still sitting there and it will eventually get cold if she doesn't grab it sooner or later, but she's okay with not drinking anything. All her mind can think about, which certainly isn't _tea,_ is a decision weighing heavily on her mind, but Hale doesn't know if there's enough courage for her to admit it yet. She is able to face off trained killers in the arena, suffer through the life of being a victor, ostracized by her home community, but not loved fully by the Capitol people who are supposed to be her new community, and all she is doing is going from fringe to fringe trying to make it out alive. Her fellow victors are not a family, not even close, but when she's here, they're the only people she is able to talk with, the only people she actually wants to converse to.

Her stomach twists and churns and spits out fire, she pressing a hand against the back of her neck to stem out of a yawn. It sickens her, when she puts on the beautiful, frilly aquamarine dresses, latches onto some Capitol man who is in every social circle, standing on top of the presidential mansion's balcony with Calhoun and Bonnie, laughing the night away, drinking glasses of champagne and applauding at the fireworks. She does not have a problem, truthfully, with the president and his wife. She's met everyone in the Capitol group, from the Head Gamemaker to whom she loathes, to the Master of Ceremonies to whom she tolerates.

She grabs the tea cup a bit too hastily for her own liking, some spilling over the side and onto the floor, but she knows that, sadly, an Avox will come and clean it up like their life depends on it - which is more or less the case - and whenever she tries to reach down and do her humble part, there's someone in the shadows glaring at her. It is best, for Hale, to sit back and let the dominoes fall where they may.

They've been silent for quite some time now, she might as well break the ice by jumping right through. "So, Arizona told me about his two tributes, Hero and Victoria."

"What about them?" Lance furrows his eyebrows together.

Automatically, she can read that his mind is gearing towards a more dejecting response, as Lance is one who has been against the Careers having outside tributes join for the longest time, as it is due to an outsider from District 8 in his own Career pack that led him to his victory. Hale has seen the tapes, where on the very first night, right after the Cornucopia bloodbath and the new guy is going on to take watch, one by one in pure silence and secrecy, he manages to kill the other five Careers, District 2 has their necks snapped, he suffocates the male from District 4 with his own pillow, slices the girl from District 4's throat, and stabs Lance's partner to death. Lance is lucky enough to wake up from his own district partner screaming in pain, the rest dead... and Lance who normally would've collapsed out of sheer terror and disbelief, uses their deaths as a vengeance against the outside Career. Seven people died in the bloodbath, six Careers died on the first day, and Lance spent the rest of his arena time trying to break the seal on his mind.

Hale sees her own fair share of death, but what Lance experiences and goes through, she can only fathom how his mind operates now. A current of shame ripples through her body. She looks down at herself, hands clenching the sides of the couch, leather bunched into tanned fingers. How the mighty do fall, she laments, how she is unable to look herself in the mirror and not see the faces of the female tributes she killed in the arena. How proud Hale had been when she's younger to being selected for the Career Academy, training _and_ training _and_ training to ultimately get there at eighteen and wreck house... only to realize three weeks later that this experience isn't worth it, it hasn't been worth it, and it will _never_ be worth it.

"Apparently they're very good."

"Good how?"

"Good enough to score higher than Marcus and Valencia," Hale smirks. She's met the two of them, this Hero Slade and Victoria Armstrong, but she's unable to keep the frowns down to a minimum, because all she sees is the excitement in their veins, the determination that boils in their soul, and how chances are, they're _not_ getting out of the arena alive, at least not in the way they want to. Being sent back to Ten in a box, body flushed out of all fluids, skin gone cold with the blood being dried, hearts no longer beating, those pretty smiles no longer shining.

Kevia scoffs. "Do you hear yourself, Hale? Those two are both fifteen years old. To joint the six of them?"

"We were strong when we were sixteen," she points out.

"We're Careers," Lance interrupts, although his tone is much gentler, much more lax and responsive to the situation in the room. "Trained in a highly prolific Academy by the best of the best, by _us,_ and even the Capitol supports it."

"Hector and Arizona have been training them like Careers. Just the two of them. Groomed for three whole years," Hale says. She has no idea exactly, _why_ she is pushing so hard for these tributes. She's met them once, shaken their hands, seen the sparkle in their eyes, but that's it. She's taller than both of them at her age, and yet these kids look like they couldn't hurt flies if they tried. In her mind, all Hale wants is to stay in Arizona's good graces. Even though he is the one constantly threatening their marriage, she wants to stay pleasing as long as she can, until the sun is blotted out and the sky goes black with fury and pain.

"Absolutely not," Kevia's mouth forms a tight line. "Now, that kid from 12, the big guy, we could use him. Two fifteen year-old's from Ten? Not a chance, Hale. Tell Arizona that."

"Why should I be the one to tell him?" Hale is having a very strong, and very sudden urge to be the one to vault the tea across the room at the traitorous female victor on the other side. Hale sees the way her eyes illuminate, the way she tilts her head to the side like a cat, the way she observes... all Kevia is doing in this world is being in for herself, and she is not standing for that.

"He's the one who brought the terms to you, didn't he? It should come from you," Lance rides the coattails, always Kevia's little _pet._ Hale leers her eyes at them. These people who are ye of little faith.

Kevia sets her tea down as gently as she can, flapping her arms all around the room like a spastic bird. "Besides, the Careers this year are crazy, aren't they? Valencia wants to reshape the entire Career image, Marcus has decent skill and an ego to match it, Milor shakes whenever someone speaks to him, Persephone as you've said is so lost she's in the ocean, Maisey has no weaponry skills, and Carrion has anger issues getting in the way of things. Our alliance is going to need to help each other before we let other outsiders in."

Hale rubs her arms innocuously. Yes, Kevia has a point, but she is still frowning. What she says about Milor and Persephone stings down deep in her heart, a sharp barb that is unable to be removed. "Well, at least Milor and Persephone are a team. It seems to me that Valencia and Marcus hate each others guts."

Lance chuckles. "Well, when you're Marcus Pharadane, everyone is likely to hate your guts."

The female victor from District 2 likes the way Milor and Persephone interact. They've been selected at a young age to partake in this very undertaking, Hale and Ellison smart enough to sit both of them down and lecture them on what the Games mean, that only one of them, when it comes time to it, will be winning. Not both, _just_ one. Milor locks eyes with Persephone, Persephone locks eyes with Milor, and they shake. It is a magical moment, for Hale, that the two of them are supporting each other every step of the way. The way her tribute - in the mentoring sphere, usually it is gender match-ups - is a perfectionist, wanting to smooth out her rough edges, and there is Milor patting down the rough edges so they're bumpy, but still sweet, still there, still making Persephone, _Persephone._ How, when Milor falls, she is picking him back up, and the glow in his eyes as they hug.

Hale has a sudden urge to cry.

"You guys have never been so against new people before..." she keeps her lip from quivering, but it is taking an effort.

"Let's say, the rules have changed," Kevia's lips stay still and tight.

Hale wants to comment about something else that might be _too tight,_ but before she can, the elevator doors open and out steps Marcus and Valencia, both dripping in sweat, both looking exhausted, but that must mean Milor and Persephone are looking for their own mentors too, their own fellow victors. Hale sets the tea down, which is actually quite terrible; she's overstayed her welcome and she does not want to be on the floor for much longer.

Lance stands up first, ever the social guru. "Marcus, Valencia, this is Hale Cornerstone, victor of the 87th Hunger Games. Hale, this is Marcus and Valencia."

"Hello, ma'am," replies Marcus, but the way he says it is so loaded with extra butter on the tone that Hale rolls her eyes. She is hardly a _ma'am_ in the Capitol world right now.

"Yeah, nice to meet you, sure, whatever," Valencia interrupts, and even though there seems to be pauses, Hale is having a hard time coming to terms on the girl's brashness. It seems as if the female Career isn't even looking in the other victor's direction, instead starting to roll back the arms of her training outfit. "Kevia, Lance, we need to speak to you." There's urgency in her voice.

Kevia frowns, standing up, Valencia's tone alarming. "What about?"

"District 10," Marcus breathes, hands on his knees as he gets himself back to normal.

"We want them to join the Careers," Valencia rides on his heels.

Hale raises her eyebrows in surprise, looking over at the District 1 victors, crossing her arms over her chest, letting out a light laugh. "How does that crow taste, guys?"

Whatever Hero and Victoria did must've been impressive, Hale deduces, but she decides she doesn't want to stay anyways. She can find out about the fireworks tomorrow instead.

After all, in this pit of vipers, Hale is surprised she forgot her anti-venom in case she's ever bit. But who is she kidding anyways...

Hale gets bitten all the time, and nothing's downed her yet.

* * *

 ** _Bonnie Rodney: Mutations Designer P.O.V_**

* * *

Stock images of fangs stay highlighted behind her closed eyes, chills sliding down her spine, and her breaths are slight and slow; she's lying down, in the cold, on the living room floor, next to the fireplace, yet she's freezing. Lights dance above her head in a synchronized time, bands of halcyon and wire plastic white string across, aurorae borealis in tandem as the lights flicker with the crackling of the fire.

It isn't even night, yet, Bonnie laments, turning her head to the side on the carpet, loving the plush feel that comforts her flesh, as the sun is just barely starting to sink beneath the ground, just barely starting to show the pealing sunbursts and radiating cardinals that ripple through the sky. Bonnie loves sunsets. She has always loved them, even when she is young and stupid and hardly a fraction as beautiful. Nowadays she likes sunsets and is stupid, no longer feeling young. Whenever she looks at her hands and spreads her fingers apart, Bonnie can feel the bones cracking, she can feel the way there is air in between the rest, a vacuum, empty space that frightens her. She's always wanted to peer into the void, but she's unable to do so unless she has permission.

The sound of a door opening in front of her, Bonnie too lazy to lift her head up and see who it is.

"Bonnie..." comes her husband's soft voice, a voice befitting that of an angel, and yet all it does is make her shiver. She is tired of hearing his gentle cadences, his slight mannerisms. She wants something exciting, but Bonnie is not an unfaithful woman; she sticks by the sides of her tormentors even whilst the tormenting is going on. She'll drink from every poisoned cup in a room for him, yet she knows deep down in her heart, which holds the Ace of Spades, that he is never going to do the same. "What are you doing?"

"Living exhaustedly," she says, still laying on the floor. Bonnie frowns, looking to the left this time instead of the right. "Why are the lights on when it is still daylight outside? And why do we have the fireplace going in the middle of August?"

Calhoun is standing in the corner of his study, reading glasses perched slightly down on his nose. He has a book in his hands, something that Bonnie is unable to read the cover of while she's snuggling up the carpet. Her husband places his glasses aside on top of a fine china cabinet, which he has to stretch up high to reach. "I was doing some reading earlier and I decided to go into my study. I forgot to put out the fire." He walks over to her, lying down next to his wife.

It is a moment in her heart, reminiscent of everything she's ever done, that Bonnie is content. The man by her side is her husband, her president, and she's his wife, his best supporter, and together they could put plans in motion that'd catapult Panem into a new century, into a new lifetime, into a new and _wonderful_ world. However, whenever she turns over to look at him, which she does, putting her head together with his, flesh linked to flesh, souls intertwined like their fingers... her mouth fills with a distaste as if she ate holly. She reaches for his hand, holding it close to her chest so he can feel her heartbeat.

"Your heart is beating like crazy," he comments, eyes widening, yet his gaze appeasing, and she exhales.

"That's because I'm overworked. I spent all day making final touches on the two mutts."

"And you still can't tell me anything about them?" Calhoun smirks.

"I'm a locked safe, darling," Bonnie grins back, locking harder onto his hand.

Bonnie, looking at her husband, keeps the criticisms to herself. Likewise, as she's tired, so does Calhoun look, with bags underneath his eyes and it is only around five in the afternoon, almost evening. She's always wanted a tall husband, and while he does play the part, there's _more_ he could aspire to. She loves dark, luscious red hair, and unfortunately the most powerful man in Panem doesn't. She looks down a bit, away from her husband's eyes, lips parting open somewhat. All she can think about is yesterday morning, with Rennie, in the Gamemaker Center.

She does not know what came over her then, looking at Rennie. She is unable to lie to herself and say that there isn't anything in there for her in him, in that Avox with the lovely hair, and the sweet smile, and the even sweeter touch, confectous in mannerisms and appearances... he is able to make her heart beat like a drum, where she looks at him and blood roars in her ears, yet she stands there still, wringing her hands.

 _You're married,_ her mind tells her. _You're married to an amazing man who'd do anything for you._

Bonnie continues to fret, she is sure there are worry lines and creases all over her face. Calhoun frowns, noticing this.

"Bonnie, what's wrong?"

She licks her lips, swallowing heavily. There's a certain method to things, and she's pretty sure she's about to disrupt said method if she goes where she wants to go. Bonnie Rodney, the technical First Lady of Panem, if there is even a title for that, and she's afraid of telling the truth. Her mind wanders instead to yesterday morning, the way she can see how Rennie's eyes light up, precious diamond orbs, and she wants them, she wants them so badly but Bonnie is too terrified to reach out and take them, the silly little girl, the stupid little girl that she is looking up at the sky on moonlit nights. She pretends to not notice the way his mouth swallows, the way part of his neck quivers, how he exhales in ecstasy when one of her hands reaches through him... and then the way he pulls away, as if he took the heat of the fireplace behind her with him.

The woman is crazy, she knows this. Bonnie has Calhoun, and she cannot believe she is saying this, but Rennie has Lewlyn.

Bonnie has never really been eye-to-eye with her, the Head Gamemaker, and that despite all of her faults, and a bit of the power play she enjoys with Rennie being her Avox, the head designer of the mutts in the arena can see it clear as day that Lewlyn Davis, amidst all of the problems that make her character, loves Rennie romantically, for some reason, and she's unable to build the puzzle that gives away the answer. In a strange way, the Head Gamemaker, who is the person to hold her brother's tongue and cut it out of his mouth - Bonnie will not lie, she's seen the clip, fascinated by the procedure, looking back at Calhoun in the other room, gaze all knowing on where the pincers should then go - has a strange fascination, a strange love for her brother, and here Bonnie wants to step into it and ruin it.

"Nothing," she lies.

"Bonnie, you're not a good liar," Calhoun persists, pressing their foreheads together. "Please tell me what's wrong."

She rolls over onto her back again, the warmth of the fireplace washing over her skin, a cleansing burn, a soulful release of aura, wisps of smoke curling like witch fingers into the air. Bonnie closes her eyes, seeing behind them the Avox's precious face, his pale face, those pale fingers, those pink lips, and the bruises she has left behind.

"I think we're drowning in a pit of vipers, Calhoun."

He scoffs, not _at_ her, but more at the words, the metaphor. "What?"

"I don't think there's a single person we know that we can trust besides ourselves."

Calhoun gets up, balancing on his palms which are placed on either side of her head, he above her by a good two feet, he looking down at his wife. "What are you talking about, Bonnie?"

"Lewlyn... with this Quell, what if she-"

"I've already spoken to her about it," he interrupts.

"And you trust her?"

"Only a fool would trust Lewlyn Davis, sweetie," Calhoun says.

Bonnie rights herself on her elbows, shifting up a good bit. _"Only a fool would trust Bonnie Rodney, yet look where we are. Married, childless, and in power because you trusted me,"_ she thinks to herself, and then aloud, "We can't trust Pollux, I'm pretty sure."

"Pollux?" Calhoun makes a face. "He's my best friend! What would he gain from betraying us?"

"I don't know. He just... he rubs me the wrong way," she rubs her arms innocuously. This isn't a lie, at least it isn't one that she knows of. Bonnie isn't so sure whose lies, whose lines she is saying anymore, whether they be hers or someone else's. Something about Pollux Aetos has always rubbed her the wrong way, but she narrows it to the fact that he eyes a certain redhead in uniform as well, licking his lips and wanting to taste the forbidden fruit.

"You sure it isn't all the work that's just getting you paranoid?"

Bonnie closes her eyes briefly, swallowing. There it is. There. It. Is. His patronizing tone, the way he gives a slight smile at the end of the phrase to try and make her feel better, yet all Bonnie feels is the sharpness of claws running down her back, of fingernails scratching out her eyes, of nails being driven into her palm, of scalding hot water being poured down her throat whenever he begins to patronize her. She ambles to her feet, going over to the fireplace, keeping her back turned. Calhoun stands likewise, but he doesn't necessarily go after her, and that's because he doesn't need to.

They know so much, there shouldn't be a reason to even try and comfort each other.

"It isn't that," she insists, wanting to scream at him for acting like the devil, but she just _can't_. "I know what I'm feeling." She slips off her wedding band, holding it in her fingers. Bonnie's gaze flits down to the fire, seized by the way the fire licks at the air, crackling and desperate for breath, and that it would be quite unfortunate just for the ring to slip off of her already loose grip and into the fire... but Bonnie knows she cannot part ways with it. She loves him, and doing this just means that she's violated every sacred piece of herself that she knows. "We can't trust Rennie either, Calhoun."

"Rennie? Why not? He can't talk, Bonnie. Last I checked, the man isn't able to slip up secrets," Calhoun furrows his eyebrows, putting a hand on her shoulder. "What has he done to make you think that."

Even at his prompting, she still does not turn. She doesn't want to turn. "Yesterday morning, in the center, while we were working, Rennie tried to kiss me," she shudders. "I told him to stop and not to proceed any further, and he listened, but he still... he _still..._ " she breaks off the sentence, hugging herself tight.

Calhoun wraps his arms around her, kissing her in the back of the neck. "Shh... Bonnie, it's okay. I think Rennie didn't try to make it anything it wasn't. He's smart. Do you want me to remove him off of your personal team and have him strictly with Lewlyn?"

"I don't know," a lump fills in her throat. "A hundred percent of his time with Lewlyn is a death sentence, and he doesn't deserve that..."

"We're going to be okay, Bonnie," the president assures her. He kisses the side of her head. "I love you."

"I love you too..." she whispers.

Bonnie puts the ring back on her finger, staring into the fireplace, the way the wisps dance, the way they tango and twist around the coals and logs, and the way they match her soul, fiery, wanting to eat whichever bits of oxygen they can.

She doesn't change her facial expression, liking the place she's in, with Calhoun's arms wrapped around her, she holding back onto him like the lifeline he is.

They're in a pit of vipers, she and he, surrounded by poisonous snakes and there's nothing she can do to fend them off.

In fact, there's the worst one in the very room. Perhaps even the worst in the entire Capitol.

And no, she isn't thinking about her husband.

* * *

 **I have to say, this chapter was _extremely, extremely, extremely_ fun to write. We're back to having the good ole Hale, Lance, and Kevia on screen (Arizona will be back, don't worry ladies and gentlemen), and the ever amazing and fun to write, Bonnie Rodney. I must say, so far, this last half with her and Calhoun has been my favorite part of the story to write so far, as I just love drama, I love the things that I have included... and can you all see where these storylines will head? Remember, all nine characters (Calhoun, Bonnie, Lewlyn, Rennie, Hale, Arizona, Pollux, Kevia, and Lance) will have their individual storylines cross with each other... any predictions?**

 **We are going to be back with the daily scheduled programming of tribute chapters again with Chapter #16: Two Stages of Killing, where we are to meet the last four tributes from our cast of twenty-four that you all have yet to have a point of view from. From there on, each character is going to have at least another point of view (so we'll see from Milor again, Annabellina again, Peri again, Colt again and so on and so forth) once more before the bloodbath, so keep your remembrances handy, because once every tribute has their second point of view, by the time that's up... it is bloodbath time, which is Chapter #23: Prey Versus Prey, something I think works well. I'll be blunt now, Chapter 16: Two Stages of Killing, will not be posted until January 31st, end of this month. The chapter is already finished, I need to edit it. I want to write out to at least Chapter 20 before I continue posting, but I will definitely have #16 out by the 31st, and I promise, Shiro, it won't be any earlier!**

 **Keep at it you amazing guys! I hope you all do review the next bridge in the Capitol storyline. If you guys review, I would really appreciate a bit more in-depth or a bit longer of one, especially with Calhoun and Bonnie's section, as I think it is one of the best sections of a chapter for a story I have written in a long, _long_ time; it'd be greatly appreciated. _And_ I hope you guys are just as excited as I am, because I can't seem to stop working on and writing this story; I haven't done this in _years,_ back when my writing was so damn dreadful that I can't read it anymore. I love you all so much! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	16. Two Stages of Killing (Intros VII)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #16: Two Stages of Killing, which we are going to look at the final four tributes - all of which you've had referenced, but not a physical point of view - is for this chapter, and good, because soon,** ** _soon,_** **you guys, is the Cornucopia bloodbath. Man, having everyone introduced in seven chapters was much easier than twelve, I'll tell you that right now. Last chapter was a Capitol storyline chapter, and things are afoot, but let's meet these last four tributes. I know, I _know_ I said that I wouldn't be posting until the 31st, but I actually lasted six whole days and they were terrible days, so early, here you are... enjoy Chapter #16: Two Stages of Killing.**

* * *

 ** _Deacon Fincher: District 3 Male P.O.V (13)_**

* * *

Though this isn't exactly what he's been wanting to do since arriving in the Capitol, to be handed off to the gods of the Hunger Games, thirteen year-old Deacon Fincher knows deep down, using his brain that he sometimes forgets is there, that working together with others is going to be the way to win. He'll deal with trying to discard them to the side later, but when he looks down at his youthful hands, at his blemish-free hands, a bit of him sours... this might not be as easy as he thinks.

Everyone is back in the training center, the air a bit more hospitable than tense, which is surprising. It seems like a few of the Careers, District 2 and the girl from District 4 in particular, are going around helping others with their weapons training, which has Deacon turning his head and frowning. If they're supposed to be the ones killing everyone come two days from now, then why... he is all sorts of confused, and confused is probably not even the best word to cover it he's pretty sure.

However, what he does know is that despite wanting to go lone wolf for the time being with the crazed idea that he can actually survive inside some sort of arena all by his lonesome, is that he needs allies and there's nothing or no one better to start with than the very first and centralized ally that he can choose from... his district partner. He's gonna be blunt and put it out there, since it seems like she likes to do that as well.

He doesn't like Rochelle Pascal or however he's supposed to spell her name. He wouldn't like her even if she dips herself into chocolate and makes herself look desirable, he still isn't going to buy it. Deacon sees only one instance of her, that being on the train ride over to the Capitol, in which she rudely inserts herself into his manners - which he is more then capable of keeping under wraps, thank you very much - and he isn't impressed, but he figures he isn't supposed to try and be impressed by anything anymore, as once he steps foot into the Capitol, there shouldn't be any surprises.

With his silence, Deacon is stuck inside his head, that'll he admit. He cannot get over how he acted during the reaping, standing there still and crying his eyes out on stage, hoping, begging, _pleading_ for someone to come and save him, and yet nothing happens. All he feels is the cold thaw of the wind against his skin, black locks of hair blown back, eyes filling themselves with the mist of emotion, and then all Rochelle can do is criticize how he eats... the nerve of it all. Deacon doesn't know what he wants to do with the time he has, stuck between survival skills or picking up a new weapon, as he wishes he could be proficient at both, but examples have shown that spending too much time trying to balance a multi set of attributes only leads to a far worse outcome than before. Deacon does not want to be one to die at the bloodbath.

He'd like to not die at all if it is in his power to do so, but once again, he looks down at himself and makes a frown.

According to his schedule, and what his mentors have asked he and Rochelle to do, it has come down to the fact he is being forced to be there with her every step of the way for the whole day. In fact, he's standing in front of the tumbling rack, a piece of equipment - rather almost like an obstacle course than anything else - that is the length of the entire back wall. Mats of various sizes ae placed down on the ground, with occasional high rise walls of some kind to jump over, at least that is what Deacon _thinks_ they are for. He has a different idea in mind.

But, there's something else he wants to address first.

Rochelle is standing behind him, arms crossed over her chest, but she isn't moving. In fact, she is more focused on the District 10 tributes, Hero and Victoria, who are this time fighting each other in the circular ring of dummies. He snaps in her face, trying to draw her attention away. Deacon knows that the only reason why she is even looking in that direction, being the only tribute to actually _do_ so, actually, is so she isn't looking at him. It is written all over her face, down to the last detail.

"Rochelle," he interrupts her train of thought, she blinking and looking out of place. "Hey, Rochelle!"

"What?" she asks, her voice sharp and irritable, which pulls a frown from Deacon's expression. She, noting his fallen face, softens her tone. "What?"

"It looks like you've been wanting to say something to me all morning and you haven't yet. What is it?"

Rochelle bites down on the bottom half of her lip, and he's afraid she's chomping down so hard she is going to draw blood, but nothing like that happens. She looks down at her feet, shuffling her shoes on the black tile, and Deacon stands as approachable as he can, not crossing his arms, not raising an eyebrow, and certainly not tapping his foot. Patience is a virtue, something he wants to try and exhibit, so perhaps it'll let him go a long way.

"I'm sorry," she whispers, but he isn't going to be an asshole and ask her to repeat it just so everyone around them can hear her say it. "I'm sorry for how I acted to you on the train."

Deacon is not expecting that, he knitting his eyebrows together in surprise. Half of him wants to lean back up against the wall, face smug and not accept her apology, just so he can see her sweat, as it looks like she does that a lot, but he knows that isn't him, not truly. None of this around him _is_ him, Deacon isn't a killer. He's a scared, timid thirteen year-old boy who just recently learned what pimples and arm hair were and where they all came from. Deacon pulls at his collar of the training outfit.

"Well, thank you. I'm glad to hear you say it."

"I hope we can be allies," Rochelle extends her hand out.

He heartily shakes it back, smiling for what it is worth, which might not be very much. "Me too." He turns away from her, then, cracking his knuckles. From what he's seen the Careers do, primarily the girl Maisey who jumps around and over the obstacles like a damn monkey, it is something, this course, you have to run over to complete. Deacon grins to himself. He's trying to remember the last time anyone in the games showed off _this_ skill.

Deacon is about to get a running start, completely forgetting that Rochelle is behind him, in which he bumps into her, nearly falling over. "Deacon, what are you doing?" The annoyed tone comes back on, and it doesn't look like Rochelle is in a place to try and remediate it, the scourging tone remaining, the sharp and bitter acid taste in his mouth returning, and he wants to already call this temporary alliance off if all they're ever going to do is bicker at each other.

"Just... just stand back," he says nervously, hands starting to shake. This is for all the marbles. This tumbling track obstacle course design is long, and that means he has enough time to get everyone's attention in the room, Careers included, and even perhaps make Rochelle Pascal forget that he has bad manners when eating. "That's all I ask."

Rochelle moves timidly, going over to his old spot, eyes widening, but she doesn't say anything. Deacon extends his arms outwards, splaying open his fingers, the crackling of air bubbles and the resonating _SNAP_ of tension dissolving under his skin causes the elixir of life to flow through his veins. _This is going to be good..._

He begins to run at the mat, and the moment his foot crosses the threshold of cold tile to the mellowness of rubber, he throws his arms down, his body forward, and he twists into a backbend. Like a coil, his body goes taut, tightening with pressure, muscles tense, and when he releases like a spring, Deacon transforms into a back-springing tribute, he going down the track doing gymnastic trick after gymnastic trick. Deacon bounds up over one of the wall obstacles, spiraling as he does so, twisting this way and that before landing cleanly on the mat over the side.

However, he never remembered how to stop... and his eyes widen to explicable heights as the grayness of the rear wall comes closer and closer to his face right before he slams into it face first, pain sprouting all over, red dots in his vision. A groan of pain escapes his throat, the elixir of life is replaced by an elixir of embarrassment, a plague of red cheeks and dashed hopes, Deacon lying flat on the last mat, trying to blink away the agony.

Rochelle runs over to him, squealing something god awful, before reaching out to help him.

"Deacon! Are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah..." he grunts, getting to one knee. "I'm fine."

In his mind, however, he is simultaneously laughing his ass off, a clear divided table of two personas, one smiling and giggling, the other sobbing and holding their knees to their chest. Shaking away the spots and the stars and the brightness, Deacon wobbles a bit in place, before leaning back up against the wall.

He's not even sure if anyone but Rochelle pays any attention to the somewhat epic feat he achieves, until perhaps it is too late.

" _Well,"_ his mind giggles, actually _giggling,_ " _So much for a first impression._ "

Oh shit... Deacon's mind went off, alarms blaring in his head.

He's dead meat.

* * *

 ** _Marina Penweather: District 8 Female P.O.V (13)_**

* * *

"We should be learning how to use a weapon, Marina," complains Galiant, he picking up one of the leaves he crushed in his hands, letting it fall to the ground, to then pick the scraps back up again. "Everyone else is, and we're here deciding how to make herbs and medicinal spices..."

Thirteen year-old Marina Penweather, the numbers girl, the one who people will find counting out statistics instead of sheep in her sleep, looks over at her district partner, one hand holding a ceramic bowl, the other a twig currently crushing up said unidentifiable objects in the ceramic bowl. "Do you have any idea how stupid that just sounded? Let's go learn a weapon, _while_ I am helping us learn how to make medicine to save our lives. Yeah, don't listen to Marina, she has _no_ idea what she's talking about..." she trails off, shaking her head. Galiant is one of those people, she thinks, that is like a horse who only complains and neighs when the time is necessary to do so, getting led to the watering hole, but not taking a drink. If he wants to go and shoot clay pigeons with Marcus Pharadane, he can be her guest.

Granted, as she looks down at her ceramic bowl, she isn't quite so sure herself she knows what is exactly in the container, but she'll simply shrug her shoulders and try again. It is one of her favorite spots in the training center; there aren't many eyes on her, only two, those being Galiant's, but even then there is a calmness to this corner of the training center. The sound of the spears and knives hitting the hearts on the dummies from the Careers are only mere, dull thuds, whereas if she is any closer, it resembles the sound of blades slicing open flesh... she is okay with not being around that.

However, she will point out that Galiant's sharp gaze watching her every motion like some hawk about to eat its prey is nothing exciting for her, her arm trembling as she holds a spoon and dumps some white powder into the bowl. She's waiting for him to bark at her, he on the edge of anger every waking second it feels like, the precipice of danger and uncertainty, and the unknown. Marina doesn't know what to expect from him anymore, after their talk on the train, in which she sits there as he sobs, unable to really _do_ anything, though later he does tell her how much he appreciates her company. Since then, though, it is almost as if she doesn't exist, and Marina Penweather is some invisible person to him, and she cannot deny her true feelings; they sting, they hurt, she wants them gone, she wants _him_ gone.

She's willing to go alone if she has to.

Galiant looks over her shoulder, then makes a soft _hmph._ Marina slams the wooden spoon down on the sandpaper tray that she's currently hovering over. "What, Galiant?"

"Any idea what that white stuff is?"

"No..." she frowns. "Why?"

"I want to try it. What if it's like those drugs the seniors use?" Galiant's voice gets an octave higher.

 _Oh no, that is not happening on her watch._ God, Marina feels like his mother. She immediately turns around, placing her hands on his chest - oddly enough, there's a strange bit of formation there, something she most certainly does not have - and gives him a light push. It is as if she is trying to push the entire presidential mansion with her, he not budging an inch, and Marina actually slipping somewhat into the table, hitting it hard enough that the contents of her makeshift remedy spill out onto the sandpaper. Fire burns her soul, and even the split ends at the top of her head.

"Nice job," Galiant whistles.

"We're not going to do drugs," she redirects the conversation, trying to submerge her anger underneath the blue of her bloodstream, avoiding the fact that her district partner is being as much of an asshole as he can be right now. It looks like Galiant is not feeling all too _gallant,_ at the moment. Marina wants someone to hand her a gold star for what she just came up with... that is an ingenious idea, her pun, and she knows it.

"If you won't let me try the white stuff," it feels weird to her that she is about to _give_ someone older than her, someone way taller than her as well, permission, but weirder things have happened over the week, "Then I am going to go shoot arrows with Marcus."

Marina stands her ground, crossing her arms, glaring up at him by the good six or so inches he has on her, pitiful almost. "You are not doing drugs and accidentally getting yourself killed. You and I are here to win the Hunger Games, remember?"

Galiant puts a hand up, interrupting her, but she knows that he's only doing it because she is allowing him to get under her skin, a virus that she allows to wreak havoc. "Hold up. Marina... _I_ am going to win the Games. Not you. When's the last time a thirteen year-old ever won?"

She's pretty sure he's just saying this because that is all he can think to say, to knock down her self confidence, which Marina knows full heartedly is never even there in the first place. After all, Marina is standing there in the reaping pen, corralled like a bunch of animals, numbers floating by in her head - she is two out of nearly three thousand slips, and yet she's picked - that all the numbers fall to the ground, and she's shaking in her pen, a little lamb about to be devoured by the lion. "Well, I have a better shot than you do."

"Everyone else here has a better shot than you do," Galiant shakes his head, then locks his jaw. "Doesn't matter. I'm gonna go learn how to defend myself, while you can have fun doing whatever the hell this is."

He turns to go, but Marina isn't letting him off the hook that easy. She has no idea exactly what compels her to him, since he seems to be nothing more than the arrogant jerk down the street, the same type of person she can recognize is what used to be attractive to her, playing with hair bows and an abacus in her teacher's classroom, but then he grabs her picture off of the wall and tears it into a million and one pieces. One of these pieces on the ground has to be the slip of paper the escort seizes to draw her name from the Reaping bowl.

She grips his wrist, pressing hard enough so he can actually feel it. Galiant stops, looking down at her. "Listen," Marina grits her teeth. She's a negotiator, this is what she does, empathizing with people, getting on their side, and staying by their side, but he is currently making that very difficult, if not the most difficult thing she has ever had to face. "Just because life has dealt you a shitty hand does not mean you deserve to act all shitty towards me. You called me an idiot on the train ride, you've insulted me every step of the way since then, and all you're doing is alienating yourself," she forces him, again not doing anything except pulling on wind, towards him, "What you're not seeing is that you need a friend. _I_ can be that friend..."

Galiant rips his hand away from hers, scoffing. "How could you possibly have any idea about what I want?" he stalking away from her.

"You don't have to be such an asshole about it, either, Galiant!" she shouts at him, but it only gets him and the rest of the tributes assembled to look back at her, fear rising in Marina's throat... she doesn't want to be the center of attention and yet everyone is focusing on her, when she's the one trying to bandage up the problem. Marina remembers losing her breath when Galiant steps out of the Tribute Prep room, dressed handsomely and royally in a velvet cape like a king, she in her own silk and ivory dress... she sees a paladin, a beautiful person, someone she can connect with.

All she sees now is a monster with a large, beating, dying black heart, darker than any abyss, fouler than any stench, and slowly poisoning Galiant Rushmohone from the inside out.

Marina has her arms by her side, curling her hands into fists.

He's a damn fool if he thinks she's just going to give up so easily.

* * *

 ** _Marissa Herdier: District 9 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

She only wishes bows and arrows were a living thing. All she has to do then is pet her eyelashes, sing a sweet and soft voice, and then they'll do the firing for her. Nothing is more difficult than trying, at least for her, than drawing back the bowstring, loading the arrow, and feeling the pain that ripples through her arm muscles, draining her energy from the moment she fires... and then in the end to only miss and have all of that excruciating hard work end up for nothing.

"I don't like ranged weapons," mutters her district partner, Blake, he scowling as he fumbles with the arrow. He's doing a lot better than she is, Marissa can say that for sure, the way all her arrows are scattered about "I need to be up close and personal." As far as Marissa is aware, this is maybe the fifth sentence he's said to her the whole time.

"Well," she garners, dropping the arrow she is currently holding onto out of the bow. "This is all we've got right now. The other stations are busy." Marissa tries not saying this with venom in her tone, but it is undeniably annoying how the Careers have practically hogged up the melee areas, she trying her hardest not to look over. Dropping the arrow for practically the millionth time, all Marissa wants to do is go and take a nap. She is sure, however, if she even tries to get up and leave, Blake would stop her. With his bulk, and his face stuck in the perpetuity of what comes across as violent rage, she honestly thinks that Blake Hanley is going to be the one to win this thing, since it seems as if the Careers - she hopes she never vocalizes her thoughts aloud like she used to when she's much younger and much more idiotic - aren't truly contenders this year, a flaw getting in the way of their 'skills'.

Marissa is still having a hard time understanding whether or not the system is 'rigged.' She recalls, just four days ago now, but what seems to be an eternity, a lifetime away, a _decade_ away, is that her life is gone before her very eyes. The escort always comes a day early to get in the District 9 splendor - to which Marissa snorts and laughs to herself about what _splendor_ could District 9 possibly offer? - and he's been doing this since she's ten years old, and lying in wait does Marissa see it. She sees the way this man ticks, a Capitol guy who wishes to fit in with all the wrong circles, nervous and shaking, blue haired, and last year she beckons to him across the district courtyard, snagging her a lucky, _lucky_ man. Well, Marissa thinks the man's lucky. He very well might not be, but she isn't going to ask him for his opinion.

Four nights ago, late, she with her knee up against his crotch - the escort's crotch, to clarify - she whispers in his ear. " _If it's me, don't call my name. Call a random girl's name off of the registry," Marissa tells him, her voice slick with longing, his moans wonton with desperation._

 _"Which name...?" the escort trembles in reply._

 _"Doesn't matter." Actually, it does matter._

 _There's this girl, Marissa doesn't remember what she looks like, but she remembers the girl's name clear as day. It is four years ago, Marissa thirteen, when this shy little twelve-year-old is picked from the crowd, the girl lost her arm recently, and everyone in the district is crying. As far as Marissa can recall, some eighteen year-old who is depressed decides to volunteer instead, that volunteer getting third and the amputated arm girl being left alive. Marissa whispers that girl's name in the escort's ear. She got lucky, that girl, years ago, and doesn't seem to be grateful about it anymore. Marissa is not going to let that slide._

So, imagine Marissa Herdier's surprise on Reaping Day, twelve short hours later, when it is indeed that same amputated armed girl who gets selected, as Marissa has seen the slip of paper, and the escort calls her name instead. She finds this out two days ago, after the tribute parade, and the heat waves that emanate off of her body are enough to cook a sausage well done. However, now with the soiled bag she is given, Marissa figures it is karma getting a stab back at her. There's only so many things a nice chest and a great behind and an even sweeter personality can charm before she's lost all of her tokens.

Only one thing in Marissa's life is she able to confidently say is unable to fall to the charms of her sexuality, to the charms of her voice, and to the charms of her polite handshake that dips just a bit below the belt.

Outside, over by the barley fields, is this hill. Marissa goes to it at least once a week, where there are ponderosa pine trees as far as the eye can see, a few red emperor leaf trees, some ash and elm trees speckled through, and in this forest, this mismatch of greenery, are fireflies. Marissa can close her eyes and picture it in her head, it is an image clear as day, and now, because the escort pulled a fast one on her, she'll never be able to see it again.

Marissa wonders, rather crudely, how easy it may be to undo Blake and his ball of anger by rolling out the knots in his spine, lower back, and the button on his pants. She bites her lip, looking down for a second at him, her face flushing with heat. When he looks at her, wondering why she isn't firing her next shot, Marissa smiles. It is buttery, it is half genuine, half fake, but at least she has the humility and understanding to admit that.

She looks back down at the target, biting on the inside of her cheek. She lets go of the bowstring, it thwacking against the rest of the metal, and the arrow soars... only to miss.

"Shit!" she cusses, throwing down the bow. There is no way she is going to be able to even try and shoot the bow at this rate.

As Marissa turns, perhaps to run away from the stand and for life, Blake still firing arrows and decently landing them, she pauses. Leaning up against a column, chewing on something, is Maisey Rovneay, the female Career from District 4. Marissa swallows heavily. How long has she been standing there, and what exactly has she seen? Of all the Careers, Marissa feels a fear worse than any other when looking at this girl, the way her eyes glow the wrong way, how there's a giddiness in her step that even the most bloodthirsty tribute just does not seem to possess... and she's seen the way Maisey runs around the training center; she's like a squirrel on sugar, and her strokes of power are amazing by a huge country mile.

Maisey rights herself off of the column, stopping her chewing, Blake turning around after firing his shot. He misses too, but Marissa doesn't see him cussing and stamping the ground. The Career doesn't say anything, she stepping in between them. Marissa assumes that she is about to try a hand and probably school District 9 in such a painful, _painful_ way. Again, imagine her surprise, when Maisey places the bow that she slams down onto its holdings back into her palm.

"I- what..." Marissa tries to speak, but she's too confused to even utter coherent sentences.

"Try again," Maisey says, somewhat gentle, her eyes appraising the District 9 girl over in a quick one-two, one-two.

"I'd rather not," she begins to laugh nervously.

"Try again." The Career's eyes flash a dangerous stormy silver, and Marissa scrambles back into place. Blake has yet to really stir, let alone show any other emotion than plain numbness, but he's probably just waiting his turn.

There's two arrows left on the stand, the others all scattered haphazardly around the target down at the other end, the target Marissa keeps painfully reminding herself that she is missing like she's blind. Marissa picks it up, sliding it into place with the bow. The trainer is helpful, but he seems to have gone on lunch break, a break that has lasted sixty something years at this point, and it means she and Blake are defending for themselves out here in the dangerous world of the Career pack.

Marissa draws the arrow back, muscles tightening, air squeezing out of her lungs, eyes constricting.

Maisey steps closer to her, beads of sweat starting to spill down Marissa's forehead, her hair getting stuck and starting to glisten. The Career places a hand on Marissa's left elbow, tilting it down some, the other hand going to her left shoulder and pressing against the skin. "Relax your bow arm," she instructs. "It's too heavy. You aren't even aiming at the target at this rate."

She'd much rather prefer to tell her to go f herself, but Marissa knows that'll only mean future enemies in the arena, enemies she doesn't want. "Don't think too much about it. Let the arrow be the thing that finishes your motion," Maisey continues to teach, pressing a hand against her ribcage. "Too tight here. And you aren't even standing profile. Standing straight at the target isn't going to work. Right yourself."

Marissa mindfully applies the corrections, and when Maisey takes a step back, she isn't wasting anymore time; she's sick and tired of this Career giving her 'advice', probably all in some dumbass plan to try and make her lower her guard. She knows how insane ladies play, Marissa can see it in Maisey's eyes; she can see exactly what this fisherman girl is made of.

She lets go of the end of the arrow, releasing it, the bow snapping with a _TWANG_ and down the lane the arrow soars. It is not bulls-eye, and it is little bit off to the left where Marissa is aiming - which is the heart - but lands at the ribs. Ribs are a good place to shoot someone, to hope they die from it. Marissa blanches from the thought. She cannot believe she is thinking that at this moment.

The bow drops from her hands, Maisey having moved back, and after Marissa fires, the Career turns away, to go somewhere else, clearly, from her body language.

"Wait a second," Marissa raises her voice some, hoping to get the girl's attention. Maisey pauses, looking back, her hair in a ponytail which then flicks her shoulder. "Why did you just help me out with that?"

Maisey turns right back around, a smile on her face, one Marissa knows all too well. "I saw that you were having trouble and it looked like you needed the hand," a pause, the Career from District 4 frowning, and then resuming daily scheduled programming with another grin. "Besides, it wouldn't seem right killing you in the arena if you didn't at least know how to fight back. At least now I won't feel so guilty."

She gives a slight wave - _yep, totally senile,_ Marissa's mind concludes, Blake still speechless - and off Maisey goes. Marissa scoffs. She just received a lecture from a Career on how to shoot a bow - she's heard from multiple people that Maisey is the only one who hasn't learned how to use a weapon, so she is somewhat perplexed on how this District 4 girl just taught her how to shoot a bow, but Marissa is not one to want to get into conspiracy theories over this - to then receive a backhanded compliment on it meaning her presumably inevitable death just got a lot easier.

Marissa looks at Blake, his face softening some from the usual rock hard façade.

"Well," she opines, looking at the last arrow she has left. "I might as well give it a shot."

Her next try receives bulls-eye.

* * *

 ** _Alexandra Quinn: District 11 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

For how long Alexandra Quin has known her district partner Caiden, she is able to say quite confidently she has never seen him the way he's acting right about now, all skittish, all nervous, standing and sitting in their room and his gaze darting to the corners where shadows exist, his hands constantly fidgeting. His face is giving him away, the distress plastered all over it. Personally, she is trying to not lose her cool, every thought of panic running through her head, but she isn't going to focus on the negative. There's positives in this experience.

She's got a decent day so far with training; today Alexandra learns how to skewer someone through the liver with a knife via a very, _very_ patient trainer, and for a second, which has her grinning cheekily to herself, she thinks about practicing her newfound skill on the trainer, just to see _where_ things could end up, but Alexandra figures that means it'd be an early grave.

Her mentors have been very happy with her, Alexandra sitting somewhat on a high pedestal after she discovers that she's one of the Capitol favorites because of the tribute parade, she dressed like the Harvest Queen, a bright and beautiful auburn wig, a dress made of leaves and rubies, glitter applied to the most prominent features of her face, and she carries with her a staff composed entirely out of dragon fruit, a delightful delicacy that she's tried once after stealing it from a box guarded by Peacekeepers. Nothing is more tempting to her than the sweet bite of a piece of fruit, chowing down and devouring the angelic bits of life in her hands, and the immediate sadness that follows when it is all gone.

Alexandra knows she is no fool. Eventually Capitol favor runs out, and she's left with nothing except the cores of apples and a rusty blade, trying to defend for herself in some barbaric arena. She likes to think, as terrible of a thought that it is, that she is going to do better than her district partner, for Caiden does not seem to really be applying himself all that much. Yesterday, she is the one who heads down to train by herself, he not by her side like most usual pairs. From what she deduces via the Avoxes strange way of storytelling via drawings and hand motions, Caiden locks himself into his room, fiddling. That is all the information she's been able to garner out of it, and all she is waiting for is the perfect, precise moment to sneak in there and find out what he's up to.

She can sense the jealousy; it radiates off of him, the way he'll look at her with his bright gaze, but behind it, a sea of darkness waiting to swallow her whole. Alexandra believes - well, it is just a hunch, truthfully - that if it came down between her and Caiden for the crown, she's going to win it tenfold. She's had three older brothers in her life, and a sister, and the fights that have happened, many involving fists, some involving other things like kitchen appliances and pans and such... the girl is an experienced scrapper, and there is no way softie Caiden is going to be able to pull a fast one on her.

Her curly brown hair is still drying from all the sweat, she running a few fingers through it. It is just her and Caiden right now in the room, they sitting on opposite couches, her heart exhausted from the work, and her mind deep in thought about the enigma a few feet away from her. _What's his angle?_ It is a question she is willing to die to get answered.

"So, Caiden," she starts, her voice coming a bit out of nowhere, he jumping in shock. "What did you do before you joined us for lunch?" Alexandra is referring to the first two hours of training, where once again she goes down there by her lonesome, a few of the guys - she thinks it's the District 6 and 8 guys that give her the hardest amount of time about it - ribbing her for being alone. Alexandra knows she fight both of those cowards off and come out without a scratch on her, they look like they couldn't do anything except piss themselves and cry in a corner. At lunch, Caiden pops out of the elevator, sliding into her table to eat with her, as if he's always been there.

He scratches the back of his neck, his skin color meshing in with the dark mahogany of the sofa. "I slept in. Ate breakfast. Checked out the roof," Caiden shrugs. "Simple stuff."

"Uh-huh..." Alexandra clucks her tongue, leering her eyes. She is not buying it. From what the Avoxes tell her through their special ways, her district partner is cooping himself up his room like some Frankenstein monster shenanigans, and here Caiden is lying to her face. Her right eye begins to twitch, she slapping it so the disturbance can stop. "Right..."

Caiden's eyes light up. "I almost forgot!" He digs into his coat pocket, pulling out an apple. Alexandra's eyes widen. She admits to him after the tribute parade how apples are her favorite fruit, and apparently the Capitol also grows their own special orchard of them - nothing on the mass scale as District 11's, of course, but enough to be individualistic enough - that are provided for the tributes. Alexandra's been unable to grab one at lunch for the last two days, they always gone and not given in a large enough supply. Alexandra is not stupid enough to ask the Careers to hand over an apple. "I snuck this out with me." Caiden holds it out to her, his eyes gleaming. "You told me how much you wanted to try one and I remembered it."

He doesn't even have to ask if she wants it; _of course_ she wants it. Alexandra slides over, taking the apple from his hands, biting into it. Sweet juices explode in her mouth, Alexandra's eyes rolling back in her head, she making a light sigh. It is perhaps the most heavenly thing she's ever tasted, clutching onto it for dear life. "Thank you, Caiden!" She has to admit, his behavior may be skeevy, and his franticness might be worrisome, but she's always known Caiden to have a lustrous heart of gold for everyone and everything.

"Don't mention it," he says, still smiling, standing up and stretching. It is still bright and beautiful outside, a rather delightful setting horizon, the training center overlooking the downtown area of the Capitol, the sun shining on the pool outside. Alexandra is mesmerized by it. Caiden looks at her, she more caught up in the apple than anything else. It makes District 11's seem like absolute horseshit. "I'm going to go to the roof. If you want to join me, you can."

She nods an assurance of understanding, standing up herself from the couch and going over into the kitchen for a napkin. There is no way Alexandra Quinn is going to eat this entire delightful piece of heaven in one go, that'll be one of the silliest things she's ever done. She waves goodbye to Caiden, he doing likewise, her district partner stepping into the elevator.

Alexandra keeps the smile on her face until the doors close, dropping the apple onto the counter. There's no better chance than this, right now, and she's not about to waste it, delicious apple or not.

Practically running over to the other side of the suite, in which she is sure District 10 must love living underneath her right about now, Alexandra runs to Caiden's bedroom door. Hers is slightly adjacent to it, a little bit to the right, but what matters is his and the fact it is exposed and out in the open. If his behavior has her worried, and everyone else on the floor concerned, there must be something to it.

She almost expects the door to be locked, which is to be her luck, but Alexandra is happily surprised when it swings right open, she grinning to herself. She steps into his bedroom. Nothing seems out of place, his bed made finely and neatly, without all the Avox touches, so it looks like he himself, ever the gentleman, made his own bed. Seeing it makes Alexandra frown in shame; she left hers a mess simply because there always seems to be someone around them. She knows that there is an Avox on the floor currently, one there who is watching her every step, but she is pretty sure she has their trust and that they're not going to betray her like that to him.

Nothing else is screaming out at her, Alexandra about to leave, when she gets a look at his dresser.

Sitting atop of it is another apple, looking to be the same kind like the one for the tributes' lunch down in the center. Alexandra bites her lip. Would he even notice it being gone? Most likely not, and she only lives once, she only gets to try these Capitol apples once... and after all, with all the good luck coming to her, she wants another morsel of euphoria in her belly.

Alexandra reaches for the apple, picking it up in her bare hands.

Only two seconds later does she let out a riveting scream. Her skin is on fire, the apple touching her flesh, and this insane, sharp, stabbing pain rips through her hand. Alexandra shrieks, flinging the apple across the room. When it hits the other side, hitting the wall closer to the bathroom, there's the sound of something sizzling that comes from it, and where the apple had hit the wall, there's a black spot on the normally white paint.

Looking down at her hands, a wave of bile nearly appears out of her throat as there are these scorch marks dotting her palm from where she grips the apple, except these spots are a sickening, nearly vomit like orange.

Before she is able to say anything else, another resounding pain shoots through her stomach. Alexandra howls, downing to one knee, a sudden pressure forming in her throat.

The door to Caiden's bathroom is open, she vaulting over to it. She reaches it in seconds before the bites of the apple Caiden gives her reappear and into the toilet bowl. Though she only wretches for a good ten seconds, to Alexandra, it feels like hours and hours. There's the mad sound of footfall on the ground, the Avox appearing after the chaos and noise, standing in the doorway, face mirroring that of total fright.

Her senses are in overload, Alexandra feeling woozy, she not really even acknowledging the Avox's presence.

All she can focus on, however, is what is in the toilet bowl, her throat on fire, her hand on fire.

In the bowl, submerging underneath the water, is a black core, spiked and discolored at the tips, a warped amaranthine.

* * *

 **Well hot damn, longest chapter yet! That was Chapter #16: Two Stages of Killing, ladies and gentlemen, our second day of training, and we've finally met the last four tributes to yet be 'introduced' through their own P.O.V, Deacon Fincher (D3 M), Marina Penweather (D8 F), Marissa Herdier (D9 F), and Alexandra Quinn (D11 F). Looks like the tribute drama has been ramping up, hasn't it? I know it most certainly has... and that means great things are on the horizon.**

 **Next chapter, Chapter #17: Impressing the Devil, is going to be the private sessions, and ooh boy aren't I excited! Between now and Chapter 23, which is the Cornucopia bloodbath, we are going to get one more point of view from every tribute, so another twenty-four points of view guaranteed for six chapters... how can I do it? You'll just have to wait and see. (This entire chapter, all 7.7k words, was written in one day, so... maybe it can be done). Please review, we've met every main character in the story, can you believe it! We're moving so fast through Sheep, and it is because of you guys. I hope you all check out the forum - PM me for questions - and get that stuff going, and continue on reading and being amazing.**

 **I love you all so much! Please review, it'll matter so much to me. Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	17. Impressing the Devil (Private Sessions)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #17: Impressing the Devil. This one is gonna be fun because it is time for the Gamemaker's Private Sessions, woohoo! So... I have always enjoyed Gamemaker Private Sessions, and I am making sure to include every tribute this time. There aren't any points of view from them, the lovely 24, for this chapter, but of course they are featured. That means this chapter is probably going to be a bit large word count wise, but the physical scores will not be found out till the next chapter, but digression, digression, digression. I am going to try and cover every single tribute with a small section of their session, but if one of your tributes isn't included, it was because the length was getting _too_ long. Enjoy Chapter #17: Impressing the Devil.**

* * *

 ** _Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis P.O.V_**

* * *

She does not get much sleep last night. It is unavoidable, and this happens every year. When Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis pops her head up out from under the covers, running on only just a couple hours sleep, when she turns to say hello to her brother, the reality of yesterday comes crashing into her like a Mach truck. Her brother is at Pollux's place all because she says it's okay. Lewlyn frowns, realizing that she sort of misses Rennie to a degree, even when he is shaking at her, looking terrified out of his mind. Calhoun's words sink into her skin, from two nights ago, on his balcony of the presidential mansion. She's never really seen the man perturbed, but that night is one that'll stick in her mind for a long time.

Lewlyn shifts her legs over to the carpet, loving the feeling of the wool underneath her feet as she shuffles them across while she walks to the bathroom. She places her hands on the counter of the sink, looking at her reflection, trying to rub the edges of sleep deprivation away, but they only seem to stick harder into her face than the other way around. She groans, turning around and resting her elbows on the counter instead. Doing this reminds her of Pollux, that smug bastard, having drinks on her terrace, lusting after her brother. When her mind thinks of this, she stands up some, righting herself and looking back at the empty bed.

It is perhaps a bit pitiful, Lewlyn realizes, to think that she thought her brother would've come crawling back towards her arms, that he's wanted any part to do with her. She knows he'll still show up for the afternoon, like he always does, dressed in that cute uniform that looks dashing on him, but since she is presiding over the Private Training Sessions today, she isn't sure she'll get a chance to see him.

The president's restless state lingers in the back of her mind. Did he help her with her brother's mutilation? Why would he be having a hard time recollecting the memory if he did? Lewlyn bites on the bottom of her lip, furrowing her brow. She remembers good enough Rennie flipping her off a few hours before she marches into Calhoun's office. She cannot remember, even if someone gave her all the money in the world, his reaction, whether it be immediate believing of her words, or a simple dismissal, and she isn't also quite sure if that is because he and Bonnie are arguing around that time or not. In what messed up world would Calhoun, the self-righteous man he is, ever participate in something so gruesome? Lewlyn shudders after thinking this.

" _You, at one point, were innocent,_ " her mind tells her, a direct tone, a sharp tone, one that leaves her skin exposed after it rips her clothes off of her back. " _Now you're ripe like the rest..._ "

Lewlyn slips out of her bathrobe slowly, the fabric moving slowly across her skin, but she keeps looking down, thoughts replaying over and over again that mesh into actions, into thoughts of fright, uncertainty, and doubt. Down past the chest does her robe fall when there's a knock on her door. Lewlyn looks back at the door, the movement hurting her neck because she twists so fast. She slides the bathrobe back up, as she is not answering the door naked. It can't be Rennie, who never knocks, because he has a key.

She frowns, going back into her bedroom, still pausing to stare at the empty space beside her, no indention where his body would be, where his body _should_ be, but Lewlyn breaks her concentration away before she starts to cry. Opening the front door, Lewlyn is glad she has her towel wrapped around her waist and is being held by her hand, as she nearly drops it.

"Bonnie!" she exclaims in surprise, fingers slipping, catching the robe at the last second less Madam Rodney wishes to see the Head Gamemaker in a new light.

Calhoun's wife stands outside, dressed in a fine dark purple dress that hugs her waist, her blonde hair even more striking on the background of the dress. She smiles at Lewlyn, and the Head Gamemaker can see the way the woman is trying so hard not to leer her eyes. "Did I wake you? I'm sorry," she denotes, not really sounding to upset about it, looking over Lewlyn's disheveled look.

" _I wouldn't say you're a million bucks either, toots,"_ Lewlyn snarks to herself, and then aloud, placing a sickly sweet smile on her face, shaking her head. "No, not at all! What can I do for you?"

Bonnie places one manicured hand on the inside of the door frame, as if she is inviting herself in, causing Lewlyn to step back some. The Head Gamemaker's eye starts to twitch, but she places a few fingers on her face to stem the action. All she needs is this blonde slut in front of her to take notice and then use it to rib her every step of the way; Lewlyn knows it takes two to tango and she's been in this battle a lot longer than Bonnie has. "Calhoun is busy today making sure that the stage is set for the Interviews tonight," the head designer of the mutts rolls her eyes. "He said he and Pollux need a guy day together. Personally I think it means they're going to screw, but what do I know," Lewlyn is going to pretend she didn't just hear the president's wife say that about her husband. Calhoun is faithful, if not anything else, better than the rumors she's heard about the witch announcing her presence. "I don't feel like working on the mutts, but I also don't feel like _not_ doing anything either..." she exhales. "So, in a long winded way, I was wondering if I could watch the private sessions with you this afternoon."

Lewlyn nearly drops her bathrobe.

"I... uh... I don't see why not?" she fishes out into the abyss of the unknown for a response. Is there even a protocol for such a request? Lewlyn is unable to think back to when there's ever been anyone else besides her and the other Gamemakers in the room, but usually Lewlyn likes to be by herself in the private sessions now, helping the tributes when and where she can. In technical terms, Bonnie _is_ a Gamemaker and she's a designer of one of the key components in the arena, but Lewlyn has never had to physically work with her. Usually it has been an intern or delegate between the departments that relegates Bonnie's needs, and Lewlyn applies them accordingly to whatever she can. However, most often times than not Bonnie goes through everything that has been so carefully designed and does her own thing at the end anyways, a power trip, one gigantic lude gesture to all of Lewlyn's hard work and pisses all over it. "I mean, sure-" Lewlyn says.

"Thank you!" Bonnie exclaims, perhaps a _bit_ too happy for what the situation calls for, she throwing her arms around Lewlyn in a hug. "It can be our girl day!"

" _Remember to wash yourself ten times harder in the shower, now that she's touched you,"_ Lewlyn thinks to herself, before they break apart. "Do you want to have a say in the tribute scores?" Somewhere, anywhere, Lewlyn is dead certain that the foundations of Panem are shaking. It is only ever her and the other Gamemakers that have decided the tribute's score and that is probably the way it has been for the whole century, yet here she is, here is this breaking down walls Bonnie wanting to do things the other way, even though it is Lewlyn asking the question.

"That's okay, I don't want to do your job," Bonnie says back, Lewlyn leering her eyes at her. _What is that supposed to mean?_ That is the sort of answer she expects when an insult is to then come flying at her, but nothing happens.

"Okay then..." Lewlyn drawls out awkwardly, hoping it is becoming clear that the president's wife is starting to really, _really_ overstay her welcome at her house. What is it with everyone coming and going onto her property like it is no big deal? Boundaries exist, she is pretty sure, and yet Bonnie and Pollux seem to disregard them, and Rennie has no respect for sticking to them.

"I'll see you this afternoon, then!"

"You too," the Head Gamemaker mutters, and without another word, she closes the door in Bonnie's too perfect, too damn happy face and hopes, for what it is worth, that she maybe even broke that terrible nose of hers.

Lewlyn stands on the other side of the closed door, in her room, with an ear up against it, the sound of Bonnie's high heels clicking and clacking away down the front steps of her house. When the sounds seem to dissipate away, Lewlyn bunches up her bathrobe into her hands, burying her mouth into the cotton, unleashing a scream.

She screams, and she screams, and _she screams._

* * *

 ** _Bonnie Rodney: Designer of the Mutts P.O.V_**

* * *

For the decade plus that Bonnie has been working under her husband to get the Games back under control, she's never physically set foot in the training center, always having a good excuse to never be there. The Gamemaker Center isn't anywhere close placement wise to the Training Center, and there's never been a reason to really _go_ there, but it is a first to everything.

Bonnie has no interest in it truly being a ladies day, and she's sure Lewlyn picked up on that fact as well, the way the viper's eyes narrow in, her teeth barring, and how she just loves to slam doors in her face. Bonnie finds it particularly rude that she's treated that way; under no circumstances is it fair to treat Capitol, _no, PANEM_ royalty like that. She likes the ring to that.

Currently the designer of the mutts is sitting in a fantastic reclining chair, holding a martini in her hand, as it is a perfect time to start drinking. Bonnie smirks to herself as she brings the glass to her lips. It is ironic, she figures, exactly how many people in the high Capitol circle drink. Lewlyn does, even though the Head Gamemaker tries to hide it from the world, Pollux lets it be known, often having shots of whiskey or a bottle of vodka on the stage whilst giving interviews, and Bonnie cannot resist taking a few seconds out of her day to down a good ole wine cooler... but what her husband doesn't know, the better.

Lewlyn plops herself even distance away from the tributes, they higher up from the center floor, a clipboard in her hands. Bonnie rolls her eyes. Such primitive technology; why is she so primitive about it? Sheesh. Has she ever heard of a super amazing piece of technology called a tablet? The Head Gamemaker looks over at Bonnie, an evident distaste hidden behind her eyes, the way the pupils constrict, and how the eyelids twitch. "You ready?"

"I suppose," Bonnie shifts her legs. "What exactly happens?"

The Head Gamemaker fixes the hem of her dress, a horrid stinking paisley yellow that is not flattering at all on her body, but what Lewlyn thinks looks great and actually isn't is enough to keep Bonnie up at night celebrating the rights of the world. "Usually the tributes will come via district order, male first, then female, and they get about five to ten minutes to present their skill or skills of their choosing. If I wish to stop them early on in the presentation, I am allowed to. If you want, I can grant a bit of that power as well."

She likes to imagine that her husband will be furious to know she has a part to play in deciding the tributes' fates beyond her typical contributions, and that thought makes her smile more. "Absolutely."

Lewlyn crosses her legs, trying to mirror Bonnie and her femininity, failing all the same as her thighs are way too big and her legs too pencil thin. Bonnie giggles to herself at the sight, but plays it off as if she is laughing at an Avox in the corner nearly knocking over the punch bowl. If it isn't Rennie, she doesn't honestly care, _they_ are traitors to the system, but not her sweet, _sweet_ Rennie. "Usually it was the tributes going in District order, but recently Calhoun decided it'd be best to have the tributes go alphabetically by last name instead," she clears her throat. "This means that District 12 isn't inherently last like they'd always be, where they usually never make an impression on me than besides how weak they are."

"Well, who's last then?" Bonnie shifts in her seat. Calhoun has never relegated this back to her, she realizes, frowning. Why would the president not tell his wife of something so inconsequential? If it is so inconsequential, why does it hurt so much to come to terms with the fact that she is excluded?

The Head Gamemaker looks over her notes, biting on the inside of her lip, bringing her eyebrows together rather sadly. Bonnie has known Lewlyn for quite some time to deduce the action as her disappointment. "District 12..."

"You're kidding."

"Due to last names, Gaia Whisp from District 12 is last. Doesn't even matter, she gets the poor end of the stick."

Bonnie crosses her arms over her chest. _Perhaps it means I try and focus on them the best I can, maybe then will things work out differently than how Satan's whore wants it to go._ She grins, more to herself than outwards, in jest rather than out of spite. "Poor her..."

"Poor her indeed."

"Who's first?"

Lewlyn flips through her notes, again using the clipboard. Bonnie notices, oddly enough, that she's the only other person besides Lewlyn in the room. Usually, and this is with the training going on, she knows that there are the Gamemakers themselves always watching. How come, then, it is just her and Lewlyn? Did she tell the others just to pack up their things and go home?

"Victoria Armstrong, girl from District 10..."

Bonnie shifts her position some, crossing her legs over a bit so the dress is hitched up, the revealing way to her underwear a bit more noticeable. Through the clear railings, anyone looking up at her will see it clear as day. She smirks to herself. How many pubescent boys is she going to rile _this_ time?

Lewlyn swivels something down on the tablet, and then claps her hands, the automatic sliding glass door at the other end of the room opening on command. Time for the tributes.

...

...

 _Victoria Armstrong_

Bonnie narrows her eyes the minute the girl walks in. She usually expects, after watching the Games enough times, to know that outer district tributes never enter the room confident, they never enter the room _happy._ Even the Careers, from how Lewlyn has talked about past experiences before at social events later on have a bit of strangeness in their step, a jarring motion, and yet here is Victoria strutting in as if she owns the place. Lewlyn writes something down on her clipboard, but beyond that, it is up to the tribute in the room to do whatever it is they need to do.

She's mousy, tiny, and Bonnie finds it somewhat endearing.

Victoria goes to the knife throwing station, Bonnie's eyes following her every step of the way. She picks up a blade, and without a second thought, turns around and chucks it on a dummy all the way on the other side of the room. Lewlyn makes a soft gasp of surprise, and Bonnie is sure that is because this little girl is breaking every realm of protocol. Victoria's knife slices the air and embeds itself into the heart of a dummy that is for the sword fighting station, a distance a bit greater than the one down the lane for the knife throwing.

The girl from District 10 walks over to the knife, pulling it out of the dummy, before spinning around and slicing one of the plastic pieces behind her cleanly in two. A nice, _clean_ serration... and Lewlyn is practically watering at the mouth. Victoria does a few more tricks, but Bonnie knows she's most definitely seen enough. Ironically enough, Victoria skips rather cheerfully back over to the original station to set the blade back down.

Lethal _and_ cute, Bonnie notes. That's most definitely mixed messages.

 _Carrion Bastion_

He's a Career. Without even hearing Lewlyn say what district he is from, she figures it out immediately that he has to be from 1, 2, or 4. She looks at the drink in her hand, smirking to herself, poor Carrion stumbling into the room. When he knocks into Victoria's split in two dummy, tripping over it, he crashes to the floor unceremoniously, in an act that looks like it quite hurts.

"Mr. Bastion," Lewlyn clears her throat. "Are you drunk?"

"Yes ma'am," Carrion smiles back at her toothily, struggling to his feet. _Well, least he admits it._

Bonnie's gaze wanders with his own, Carrion heading over to the spear station. He picks one up, seemingly moving his fist up and down the shaft in a rather... lewd manner, the blonde coughing into her chest as he seems to be transfixed by the motion of his hand. When Lewlyn once again clears her throat, Carrion's face changes from a lax trance, to a more pointed one, eyebrows drawn in. He steps back some, before running forward, the spear vaulting out of his hand. It soars through the sky, hitting the target, bringing it back a good few feet.

Lewlyn and Bonnie whistle lowly simultaneously. That is some arm strength right there.

He goes for another, grabbing it, but due to how he pushed the target back a bit, when Carrion throws the next spear, he misses by a few inches, the spear falling and hitting nothing. Bonnie witnesses as he grabs the next one, breaking it over his knee, ripping a hole in the pant leg of his training outfit. When he realizes what he's done, Carrion looks back up at the two ladies, his face priceless.

"I'm... I'm sorry..." he says, this time voice almost like a whisper, all the anger and all the confidence surging away and back into his body.

"It's okay," Lewlyn puts a hand up. Bonnie is transfixed on how the Head Gamemaker is acting; she's sane, talking in a normal, almost pedantic voice, her temper not rising, and all the president's wife is expecting is a raging volcano that Vesuvius pales in comparison to. "You're dismissed, Mr. Carrion."

Bonnie makes a mental note. _Strong, but a drunkard. Honest, but explosive._ She's not quite sure, if she were Lewlyn, which thank the heavens she isn't, _where_ she'd put him.

 _Edwin Bishop_

Once upon a time, which is only just a bit ago, she remembers stopping in District 5 with her husband on some business trip to meet an up and coming scientist in the district, this kid dealing with nuclear physics and other things that just fly over Bonnie's head. The kid that they meet is shy, timid in the presence of the president, but he has an amazing handshake that sometimes has Bonnie looking down at her palm and remembering the way he firmly takes hold.

Her heart skips a beat when she lays eyes on Edwin Bishop, this same kid, a year older, standing in front of the poisonous plant test, fingers firing away, in which he gets away with an 87% accuracy. As Bonnie looks at it, she's sure that she'd be getting a good ole' 0%, as there's not an ounce of that type of survivability in her mind. Edwin goes to make a fire, and what comes out of it is a similar flame compared to the one inside her heart when she looks at Calhoun, but nothing magnanimous.

It looks like the male from District 5 is going to take a running start on the wrestling area of all places, but Lewlyn cuts him short.

 _He's no Career. He's no contender..._

Bonnie isn't quite sure if she should be upset at that deduction or pleased with it.

 _Persephone Castor_

All she can read on the girl's face is uncertainty. The way Persephone moves has a hesitancy to it, as if she is stuck talking to Janus, unable to decide which door to go through. Bonnie expects the girl, a Career nonetheless, already unimpressed, to waste her time just by standing there. However, Persephone's gaze falls onto something that Lewlyn comments about being 'unexpected'.

The girl, which Bonnie realizes, is devastatingly beautiful, walks over to a hammer lying with a few of the other aardvark melee weapons. Persephone picks up a war hammer, nearly as long as the blonde's legs, a thought that runs through her with a chill. The hammer is enormous, and yet she watches as Persephone turns around to a trainer to duel with him.

Bonnie snorts. There's no way a hefty war hammer like the one this Career has is going to be able to fight off against a trainer who has legitimate, _legitimate_ fighting experience. Lewlyn actually stands up and claps when the match is over, Persephone standing triumphant, having abandoned her weapon in the end for fists, the trainer clutching their stomach, his nose bleeding, but even the trainer grins through the pain.

However, all Bonnie can think about is, _she is unable to make up her mind._

 _Annabellina Circuit_

"Anna is going to do the edible plant test!" shouts Annabellina, the girl from District 5. That is what she says, no utterance of hello or her name or anything like that. Bonnie giggles to herself somewhat that the girl is just leaping out of the starting blocks already without an ample pace to her step. When she finishes, getting a beautiful and magnificent 100%, that Bonnie knows is never going to happen with her, Annabellina looks back at the two ladies almost expectantly, like a dog, almost.

"Anything to else show Mrs. Rodney and I?" Lewlyn asks.

"Belle has a dance for you!"

Bonnie frowns. Anna seems to be a decent name, a nickname she assumes in hopes that Annabellina wishes to escape from the confines of the world today. But now she's Belle...? The next step she turns has the blonde croaking, shielding her eyes, as Annabellina strips from her training outfit, exposing her entire body nakedly. As if there is a music playing on in her head, Annabellina begins to leap and frolic around the training room floor. Bonnie tries to peel away, but there is a strange fascination in the girl's body as she moves, clearly with no dance experience whatsoever, but she pirouettes so cleanly, her arabesques are long and high, and she even closes her ribs at times that Bonnie would've forgotten to.

She notices that there are a few male trainers with their heads cocked as if they've seen an angel. _Perverts._

However, as the dance finishes, Annabellina isn't done, it seems, as she then puts her training outfit back on, the 'ladies' having been exposed for too long. "Abe wants to destroy something!" she roars.

Turning her gaze to a dummy that has been left unscathed from the first few presentations, Annabellina gets a running start at the dummy, tackling it to the floor in an expression of brute strength which causes Bonnie to sit back in surprise. Nothing like that should be coming out of a girl's body that way.

Abe, Belle, Anna, doesn't matter... Bonnie is impressed by this madam Annabellina Circuit.

 _Milor Drusus_

Handsome as all get out. Bonnie is entranced by his illustrious stare, and his almost even more perfectly designed demeanor. He even calls both of them ma'am, something Bonnie is slightly affronted to, but it looks like Lewlyn is gobbling it up, the Head Gamemaker sitting up and getting closer to the railing while Milor walks over to grab a javelin. A bit of Bonnie's interest goes down. It looks like Mr. Drusus is just a more competent, less drunk, Carrion where they even use the same weapons.

She ends up raising an eyebrow as the career from District 2 heads to the clay pigeon part of the archery range. Lewlyn mentions, as Milor is setting up, that usually a trainer or a machine will shoot the clay pigeons in the air and the archer has to shoot them down. However, Milor kindly, as gentlemanly as he can, raises a hand up towards the trainer who hastens over to him to stop the man from getting any further. Turning the knob the farthest it can go, Milor distances himself a bit away from the machine, it angled down at him.

It fires a clay pigeon a few seconds later, Milor knocking it away to the floor with the javelin. The firing seems to accelerate, getting faster and faster, Milor spinning the javelin around, blocking each pigeon. He advances back onto the machine, managing to turn it off. In his wake is a sea of brown pottery, a glimmering mahogany ocean in the path of his destruction.

As a finishing touch, Milor then turns around and vaults the javelin down the spear range which Carrion used earlier. Despite the target being a bit farther away at the exhibition of the District 4 Career's strength, Milor manages to make the tip of the javelin pierce through the plastic.

Bonnie claps this time, alongside Lewlyn, and all poor Milor is able to do is blush. Impressive... _very impressive._

 _Deacon Fincher_

Bonnie writes him away quickly. He is lanky, tall for his youthful age, and isn't strong enough to hold any of the hefty swords he makes his way too. The bow in his hands snaps, the bowstring splitting as he is trying as hard as he can to align the string out fully. Deacon heads over to the trap making station, hands tying away at knots. Bonnie lifts her head up, eyebrows furrowed in wonderment as he occasionally glances over at the tumbling rack in the back corner, and whenever she manages to get a glimpse of his face, there's a fright in his eyes.

It is an emotion she does not expect coming from a training tribute. But she knows no one should ever see you sweat. Negative output again.

The trap is effective, however, Bonnie notes, he dragging over in quite a long period of duration, a dummy to place in the hoop, and it picks the dummy up and all the way to the ceiling. _Weak, not strong at all, clearly shows his emotions, but resourceful._ Bonnie isn't sure he's exactly what the Games need in terms of a victor.

 _Peri Florence_

She's heard all the commotion about her, from the tribute parade and their entrance illuminating the night sky. At first, Bonnie thinks her shaved head is a fashion choice, but then she _sees_ how Peri Florence ambles into the room rather frailly, stopping up against a post to lean on and taking a few deep breaths. Peri makes her way to the knife throwing station, and Bonnie watches as Lewlyn pushes up a lever on the side of her chair.

A mechanical whirring comes from underneath them, Bonnie shifting slightly out of terror, but it is just Lewlyn moving the targets a bit closer to the poor girl. Peri looks down at her feet, grabs the blade, throwing it the best she can. The first is a miss, the second is a miss, but a lot closer than the first. It seems as if she is about to burst into tears, Bonnie unsure why the girl is all of a sudden stopping. Peri has her eyes shut, the girl's head bowed down, and she's mouthing a name, or a series of words... it all seems to fumble together.

When Peri opens her eyes, she grabs a third blade, plants her feet firmly in the spot, turns side face, and she chucks the blade down the path. While it is not exactly where Bonnie hopes the knife will land, it does indeed manage to get stuck in the target's shoulder.

It is another two minutes for Peri to make her way out of the room, Lewlyn's head down, writing away, but it seems she's sniffling. Bonnie makes a face. The Head Gamemaker crying over a tribute? Highly unlikely.

 _Caiden Grove_

Bonnie feels the sudden urge to bathe, looking at Caiden, the male from District 11 tall and towering over a few of the trainers. He introduces himself with a wave of his hand, smiling. It is his smile, she deduces, and how the teeth seem to be too tight in his mouth, the lips too firm, and the way he holds himself is like a diluted poison, and all Bonnie can do is rub her arms vigorously in hopes to warm them up.

He picks up a sword, beckoning over a trainer, and the nice guy act seems to disappear. When Lewlyn claps her hand so the fight can commence, Caiden tucks himself in low, face barred from any sort of smile, and he swings with reckless abandon at the trainer. There is evident strength in his swing, as he manages to fling the sword this way and that, but there is no poetic songs being created. All force, no passion.

Caiden doesn't win the fight, which Bonnie expects, but he still thanks both of them for their time, exiting his way out of the training room. No sustenance, Bonnie notes, in him.

 _Blake Hanley_

A quiet rage seems to come from every pore out of his body, Bonnie wondering exactly what would happen if he is to get into a fist fight and how that would go down. Not that she wishes to volunteer herself for it, of course. He goes to the archery station, picking up a bow. Unlike the sorry soul Deacon Fincher, Blake has the muscle stamina to actually draw the bow correctly.

He loads an arrow, firing, but it is a bit off due to his height, the arrow skimming the top of the dummy, but not actually piercing it. A few _lovely_ expletives that Bonnie likes to utter when she's by herself in a bubble bath springs from his lips. _A dosage of Carrion in an outer district tribute, perhaps?_ Blake fires another two shots, the second making contact and nicking the elbow, the third hitting under the armpit, but most certainly not excellent bowman technique.

His goodbye, unlike Caiden's, is stalking out of the room, Lewlyn pursing her lips.

"I expected great things from him," she says dismally.

"Me too," the designer of the mutts replies. "Me too."

 _Linden Hazel_

Cute isn't quite the word Bonnie wishes to use to describe the kid from District 7, but she's run out of things to say. He's cute. His hair is in shambles, he seems to be bouncing on the edge of his heels, and he looks like there's no better place than the Capitol to be in. If only Bonnie knew it is all an act.

Linden steps onto the wrestling mat, and Lewlyn snorts, Bonnie agreeing with her in silence. He chooses the tallest man in the entire assembly to fight, the kid is not going to stand a chance. After the Head Gamemaker claps, so the fight can begin, the next step Linden takes sends fire rippling through Bonnie's veins. The kid lets out a howl, a beastly roar, angling his back and tilting his head back.

When he lowers his head down towards normal level, Lewlyn shrieks. Bonnie doesn't blame her. The look in Linden's eyes is feral, a wildness as untamed as his hair, and he grins maniacally at the trainer. He leaps upwards onto his opponent's back, getting on top of his shoulders. When the trainer tries reaching for him, Linden jumps off the shoulders and out of the guy's grasp, to then fall back onto his shoulders, effectively dodging out of the way. He turns his hands into claws, Linden dragging fingers down, starting to tear at the trainer's clothing.

Linden leaps off of the guy's back, turning around and kicking him in the face as he falls.

Bonnie isn't quite so sure _how_ Linden does it, but the trainer falls flat onto the mat, unmoving, the energy sapped out of him.

Lewlyn sits up straighter, holding onto the clipboard like a flimsy shield. "How exactly did you do that?"

"Easy," Linden replies, his shoulders bouncing, as if he wasn't a visceral and terrifying animal just a few seconds ago. "The streets taught me how to scrap. You have to defend yourself when you're out there on your own,"

Bonnie's nervous laugh isn't prepped enough for his answer. _He's a force to be reckoned with, clearly._

 _Marissa Herdier_

Plain jane, that is what Bonnie feels, watching the girl fumble like her district partner with the bow and arrow, turning side face, firing, missing, firing and missing, except her flustering leaves Marissa standing there as clueless as can be, the girl looking downcast.

"How about a knife or something else, then?" Lewlyn suggests. Bonnie knows that hopelessness seems high on the girl's list.

"You know something?" Marissa turns, a hand on her hip.

"What, sweetheart?" Bonnie asks, the girl's eyes narrowing in for the kill. _Just like how I don't like it when Calhoun, my not perfect husband in his not perfect suits calls me sweetheart, you seem to feel the same way._

"I'm only here because I was screwed over by the escort. He was going to call some random girl's name instead, but he lied and said mine instead," there's a pregnant pause, Bonnie looking out for Lewlyn's facial expression of confusion. "I want him punished." Bonnie has to give the girl credit, she didn't expect that, but there's no way that's a true story.

"How about you win the Hunger Games and punish him yourself?" Lewlyn suggests.

"That's way too much work..." Marissa complains, loading the bow one more time with the last arrow until they needed to be restocked. She draws back the bowstring, Bonnie noticing a change in her shoulders, how bicep does not tense as much as beforehand, and when the girl releases, the arrow manages to slice through the liver part of the dummy.

Bonnie crosses her arms, smiling at the queen bee. "Perhaps being bitchy makes you do well..." and when she laughs, Marissa does not return the joy.

Spoilsport bitch.

 _Rochelle Pascal_

Fast.

Bonnie gets dizzy watching the girl run and run and run around the training center, she leaping over the vaulting track obstacles, ducking underneath trainer's billy clubs and batons that they swing at her. However, it all comes to an end when Rochelle skids to a stop in front of the last trainer on the track, he holding out a large stick that covers the distance from wall to wall. There's no way to simply run past him and duck; she has to beat him out of submission.

The pit that drops in Bonnie's stomach when the girl from District 3 drops her own that is given to her down the way is as deep as the deepest trench in the ocean.

Rochelle does not look back as she hobbles outside the room.

 _Marcus Pharadane_

Bonnie is nearly relieved, though she tries not expressing her happiness out loud, when another Career comes into the room, this long, dry spell of talent that comes out of tiny bodies, or the other way around where there is no amble to how they act. The confidence is nearly overwhelming, how Marcus has his head high and he is alright with the world. Lance and Kevia must've trained him good, she deduces, but it is Lewlyn who seems far less impressed.

"Your skill, Mr. Pharadane?" as Lewlyn asks this, she is holding a pen, pressing the cap in and out, her voice going alongside the _click._

"Archery, Madam Davis."

 _Madam Davis?_ Bonnie scrunches her nose up in disgust. Why can't anyone else in the Capitol speak to her with that much respect? Amateurs, plain and simple, absolute amateurs, and it stings inside her soul that this is happening. However, as she processes this, Marcus Pharadane makes his way to the archery station. The arrows are replaced after Blake and Marissa utterly fail at them, District 9 is not doing too hot it seems. The Career actually slings on a quiver, whereas the other tributes have been picking up the arrows off of the rack... he's doing this the correct way.

He fires two quick shots down and makes decent contact in the stomach, but not bulls-eye. Marcus's third ricochets off of the right arm, going into the wall. His fourth misses the target entirely, the Career closing his eyes. Bonnie rolls her own. Now she can see why Lance complains all those months ago about some unnamed male tribute needing to have the chip on their shoulder knocked away.

Marcus's fifth shot hits bulls-eye, and apparently, as this is news to Bonnie, the moment someone makes bulls-eye, they throw in the towel. He drops the bow, bows - as if this is some royal experience that requires applause, he wishes - and out he goes. Bonnie's relieved that it is a Career session, but she's even more relieved when it is over.

 _Marina Penweather_

If Marcus is capable, thirteen year-old Marina Penweather is incapable of doing anything interesting.

All the poor girl does, which Bonnie realizes that she's calling every unsatisfactory tribute _poor,_ is stand in the center and recite statistical facts. The 1 in 24 chance of winning the Hunger Games is a 4.1% chance, which the blonde now knows thanks to the District 8 girl's spiel. Marina's chances of winning the Games is a whole, fat 0%, Bonnie smirks to herself at the joke. Marina struggles to build a fire, create a medical salve, and it is her, not Lewlyn that excuses the girl from the session.

 _Alexandra Quinn_

There's a fire behind her eyes that Bonnie appreciates. She doesn't necessarily like it, but she does appreciate it. Lewlyn breaks from protocol, clicking off her pen, and asks, "What do you think of your district partner, Alex?"

"Alexandra," the girl cuts in. "I hate being called Alex."

" _She has a spine, I like that,"_ Bonnie thinks to herself.

Lewlyn's nose flares, her irises widen, and her hands clench the armrests. Alexandra on the other hand seems entirely unimpressed. "Well, _Alexandra,_ what do you think of your district partner, Caiden?"

"I don't trust him," she says immediately, seeming to not expound upon it further, and Lewlyn doesn't ask her to.

The trap she makes seems to be a lot finer than the one Deacon constructs, although his is decent as well. Alexandra moves on from that to building a fire, which has her being the first tribute out of all of those who try in which she's legitimately successful, a ripe and roaring flame crackling alive, oxygen being sucked in by the cardinal vortex, and the look of appeasement on Alexandra's face is telling.

Bonnie thinks that if the girl learns how to fight, she could probably win the Games, over these Careers... maybe, just maybe.

 _Corvus Raynott_

His younger age has Bonnie thinking he's a bit twig like, almost like any of the other outer district guys she's seen, but there's bulk underneath his training outfit, and Bonnie shifts herself lower some so her exposed legs can get a bit more sunshine. It seems, however, her trick does not work, Corvus going to pick up a sword. However, he turns to Lewlyn and makes a request that has the Head Gamemaker furrow her eyebrows.

He does not want to actually fight the trainer in hand-to-hand combat. He wants to parry. In a series of thirty strikes, all at different speeds, Corvus twists and turns, his muscles moving like mountains underneath the clothing, alluring truthfully. In the end, he's nicked six times across his body, three of them being in his left calf muscle. When Lewlyn dismisses him, he drops the sword to the wayside, angling his head down.

"Corvus!" Lewlyn calls, sitting up. The male from District 6 pauses. "That wasn't bad, y'know. Why the sadness?" Bonnie cannot believe what she's hearing. Does Lewlyn Davis even have a motherly bone in her body?

"I came down here for the last two days after regulated hours to practice parrying and dodging. I've made perfect attempts every time," he shakes his head, lips firm and shut together, disappointment echoing behind his eyes. "That wasn't perfect..."

"Sometimes it is good enough to realize that your best won't always be perfect, and that should be okay," Lewlyn says.

If it gets through to him, Bonnie isn't sure. She hears him mutter a weak _'thank you',_ as he hobbles out, but then he's gone and all Bonnie wants to see is who is next, as once again... the kid is right. Just another disappointment.

 _Maisey Rovneay_

For being a Career, Bonnie isn't so sure that the girl has her head in the right place. The girl rushes in hurriedly, seemingly out of breath as if she misses her call time to get into the room. After very excitedly shouting her name, where Bonnie is unsure if it is Maeve or Maisey, the girl from District 4 takes off towards a column in the corner of the training center, throwing her arms around it.

"So... her act is to hug a column?" Bonnie whispers to Lewlyn. She can definitely say there's been nothing stranger so far in the day.

However, Maisey proves her wrong, she throwing her legs around the base, leaping up, up, _upwards_ until the girl is in the rigging. Bonnie watches in subdued horror, just thinking about what would happen if she were to fall, but Maisey hooks one hand through the netting above, swinging from column to column like a damn monkey, her face twisted into a strange and near creepy like grin.

Maisey reaches a bar at the end of the pathway, standing on top of it, somersaulting all the way back down to the ground in a pike, landing clean on her feet. It is all she does, the girl seemingly out of breath, and she leaves the training center right away.

"No survival skills? No weapons?" Bonnie frowns once more.

"I did hear that one of the Careers was nonconventional. Must've been her..." Lewlyn comments, biting on the end of the pen.

Bonnie gives the girl three days in the arena, tops.

 _Galiant Rushmohone_

"I am going to be honest with you here," starts fifteen year-old Galiant Rushmohone, the kid crossing his arms over his chest. "I have absolutely no skill to show you."

"Then that means you have to take a zero, Mr. Rushmohone," Lewlyn sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose. "You didn't practice with any of the weapons in here?"

"I did," he admits. "But I know I am not very good at them and it would be a waste trying to."

Bonnie likes him. Something about how the kid automatically knows where he'll stack against the rest, negative expectations perhaps, but he's seemed the most down to Earth. The Hunger Games needs that, she thinks to herself, someone to keep the realm of fantasy actually touching solid Earth.

"So you're just going to let yourself die, then?"

"Oh no, I am going to fight my hardest out of there,"

"Then I don't understand-"

"There's nothing to understand, Miss Davis," Galiant interrupts her, even sharper than Marissa, the nose flares returning in full fledged force. Bonnie definitely likes him now. "I chose to be here by applying for tesserae over and over again, so many times in fact that I was reaped because there was no way my ticket wasn't going to be selected. I came here to the Capitol to get away from my mother. I am sick and tired of trying to impress adults for something. So, I am not going to perform some skill for you just so you can give me a score. Should I win the Games, I can separate myself from my mother and live happily ever after."

"And if you die?" Bonnie asks.

Galiant's eyes cloud over, but there's a peacefulness in it. "Then I die. At least I died away from that raging alcoholic..."

Knowing that there isn't much for him to do conversation wise, he walks out, leaving the air hanging onto every word he says, and Lewlyn scribbles down something on her notepad as he goes.

"Are you really going to give him a zero?" Bonnie looks at the Head Gamemaker. "Has anyone ever been given a zero before?"

"Actually, no," Lewlyn has to pause and think about it for a moment, however. "No zeroes. A few ones. Usually it starts at two or higher."

"And what are you thinking of giving him?"

"I don't know…"

And neither does Bonnie, but she doesn't remember much of anything anymore, nor does she know how to solve any of her problems.

 _Lowelle Sable_

Whatever the effects of training were supposed to do for the tributes has lost its sparkle on Lowelle Sable, the girl from District 6 instead walking in and showing Bonnie and Lewlyn her diary, a notebook filled to the brim with notes about her competitors... a little spy in the midst, or so Lowelle Sable likes to think she is. It is always the enlightened folk, Bonnie figures, that turn out to be the most insane.

Yawn.

Bonnie's seen better.

The girl thinks she has something, she's got nothing.

Lewlyn, however, takes a tiny, mild bit of interest in it, asking if she can read it whenever there's a chance.

"Over my dead body," Lowelle replies.

Well... Bonnie likes her _just_ a bit more. Anyone who can snap back at the Head Gamemaker is amazing in her book.

 _Valencia Shale_

The moment Valencia Shale walks in to the room, the female Career from District 1, Bonnie takes notice. There's a feel to her, a shimmering around the girl's shoulders that is a strange mix of confidence, collectedness, intelligence, and beauty. Bonnie compares her, even for a second, to Persephone, and the latter wins the department hands down, but even then the roughness of Valencia makes her raise an eyebrow, as it works.

The way she collects herself, with an air of confidence that doesn't spell bragging unlike Marcus, her district partner, but a level headedness away from Milor or Persephone, it is as if Valencia is the perfect mix. Bonnie leans in eagerly, watching as the girl goes over to the trap making station, perhaps a rather unusual choice, but from Lewlyn's comments, the tributes have been acting weird and strange all day throughout these sessions; this isn't anything new.

Like Alexandra's own trap, it is a noose attached to a tree branch, Valencia covering it in twigs and leaves and hiding it into the dirt, one being unable to see it for what the trap truly is, the piece of rope dangling from the branch to the ground disguised as a vine. Walking over to the collection of javelins and spears, she places them in locations where a tribute, if they were to come across the Career camp expecting an easy kill in the middle of the night, the way they have to take around the spears and javelins places them directly in front of the noose... and if it is dark outside, there is no way that tribute will know what hit them.

For posterity sake, Valencia drags a dummy over, letting it get snagged by the noose. She grabs a sword, running through the path she creates, beheading the dummy in one slick and clean swipe.

Out of all the acts she's seen, this has Bonnie standing to her feet. Valencia's face is flushed a putrid scarlet, she taking a bow, almost awkward in its execution. The moment Valencia leaves the room, her trap still in the designed way, no one wanting to go near it. She is still clapping - Bonnie, that is - after the Career leaves. Best one of the six by far.

"I like her, I like her a lot," Bonnie smiles, a genuine one for the first time all day, perhaps.

"Me too," Lewlyn agrees. "Me too."

 _Colt Sheppard_

If Caiden Grove is burly and too aggressive with his swings, Colt Sheppard is exactly the opposite. It is as if he is trying to dance ballet - take an example of Belle, err... Annabellina's book instead, then - with his slices and strikes. Every time he brings the blade down, he hesitates against the dummy. There's nothing to it, and instead, he follows through with a light tap. A tap is not going to stop someone from chasing after you with a sword in their hand and it certainly will not stop them stabbing you to death.

Bonnie rests her head against her fist, yawning. _Boring. Boring, boring, boring..._ all this strength and the man is too afraid to even _use_ it.

At one point, the president's wife gets up, cupping her hand around her mouth. "Just strike the fucking thing!"

A look of frustration and concentration crosses Colt's face, he gripping the sword with both hands and spinning around, the blade shining an illuminating silver, the dummy being cut in two. Definitely not as clean as Victoria's swipe from the very beginning, but enough to cut it in two.

She's not sure how to feel... but it shows in the end that he can most definitely make damage happen if he puts his mind into it.

Bonnie feels her heart fill with disappointment again.

 _Hero Slade_

The male from District 10 is nearly everything Victoria is, which is cute, tinier than most, and packs quite the punch. Unlike his district partner however, which Bonnie voices aloud to Hero as he is in mid-dance with his sword, is that every single action can be read across his face. He's unable to act scared. He's unable to act nervous, unable to act confident... whatever emotion is displayed on his face... it's _there,_ and it's almost annoying.

His handiwork is impressive, Hero going through an array of dummies, chopping off limps and heads, displaying the same athleticism as his district partner, he jumping clear over the dummy and taking off its head. He digs the sword through the stomach of one, piercing the plastic all the way through where the glow of the sword can be seen piercing the back, and then Hero flips backwards, sword in hand.

The momentum is so strong, his arms and biceps bulging, _screaming_ in protest, that the dummy goes with the sword, sailing over his head, and collapsing onto the floor.

Bonnie knows it rightly so deserves a clap, and she does.

The smile on Hero's face devastates her as he exits the room.

All because she knows that he doesn't know that he isn't winning the Games, not one bit.

 _Gaia Whisp_

Last. As Lewlyn says so, this girl from District 12 is last, and Bonnie is sitting up moreso out of the fact that she wants to leave. She wants to get back to her mansion, get back to the fireplace, and stop staring at tributes. Why did she agree to view these sessions in the first place? Bonnie doesn't know anymore, as spending this much time with the Head Gamemaker has become detrimental to her health.

Gaia waves nervously at both ladies, Lewlyn surprisingly alert. Bonnie has heard from times past that the tributes often get the short end of the stick, where the Gamemakers are exhausted, tired, and bored - how the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, Bonnie realizes, that she is just like these Gamemakers who fall asleep in the middle of these sessions - and end up not paying attention to any other tribute that might've deserved the attention.

The girl goes and gets a knife, standing in front of the last few dummies unscathed by any of the tributes' wraths. She dives down with the blade, it getting stuck in the plastic, Gaia unable to rip it free.

Lewlyn opens her mouth to dismiss her when Gaia manages to snag the blade away from the hook of the plastic that had kept it stuck. The knife flies from her hands, Gaia immediately ducking away from it in case it decides to land on her skull or something. Gaia's moment of release manages to make the blade soar, she exerting so much energy in trying to retrieve her weapon that the blade flies through the air over by the station where she got the knife.

It is a good twenty or so yards from Gaia to the counter, and yet the blade manages to make its way back home, landing dead center on top of the station where the knives rest.

Gaia's cheeks flush a bright pink, she looking pleased with herself.

"You're dismissed, Miss Whisp," Lewlyn says, keeping a gentle smile on her lips, but the sadness is evident behind her eyes. The girl nods feverishly, scampering out of the room.

Bonnie lets out a sigh, collapsing back onto the chair.

Well... that's exhausting.

…

…

…

Lewlyn flips her clipboard papers over, clicking her pen and putting it back in her pocket. Though she seems to be trying hard to smile, there's a sense of exhaustion also on her face.

"So, what did you think?"

"Not impressed..." Bonnie responds.

"You'll get used to it."

"Why are you so nice to them?"

"What do you mean?" Lewlyn frowns.

Bonnie sits up, pulling her dress down, face flushed with scarlet that she even has the idea in her head about showing her underwear to any of the male tributes. If any of them noticed, they didn't say anything about it. "Giving them encouragement and things like that. Only one of them is going to win."

The Head Gamemaker bites the inside of her cheek. "I imagine all of them are terrified for tomorrow, and they don't know what's going to happen. It helps to try and give them a bit of a fighting spirit," she shrugs her shoulders. "If I was in their shoes, I'd want someone to do that for me as well."

"When did you get a heart?" Bonnie asks.

"I've always had one," Lewlyn tilts her head, a small smile appearing on her lips. "You're just never able to see it because of all the hate you harbor for me."

"Where was your heart when you cut Rennie's tongue out of his mouth?"

Lewlyn falls silent, looking down at her feet. "I don't know," she answers, and Bonnie is sure that the Head Gamemaker is being honest, if the woman even has a honest bone in her body. "I've been trying to reconcile with that. Trying to make amends."

"I don't think you can make amends for what you did."

There's so much that Bonnie wants to say, but she doesn't. She, like Linden, wants to scratch out the ginger's eyeballs. To make her watch the world around her burn, for there is no way someone like Lewlyn Davis can just overturn a new leaf like she is trying to do. Bonnie knows it takes a snake to combat one, and there's no worse one than the Head Gamemaker, no matter how many tributes she inspires.

"You're right," Lewlyn nods, sucking on her bottom lip. The Head Gamemaker smiles to herself. "And neither can you to Calhoun."

Bonnie's blood turns to ice.

"What are you talking about?"

"Rennie told me yesterday morning at breakfast about you and him. With the tablet you gave him," Lewlyn sets her shoulders. "I am okay with you letting him talk, but I am not okay with you twisting his heart like that. He and Pollux are together, I believe, which means there's no room in the picture for you." She tilts her head. "Besides, your husband is the man of tradition. What do you think he'd do if he found out you were trying to cheat on him? How would the man of tradition react to his own wife trying to destroy the tradition of faithfulness and marriage?" Lewlyn sticks her nose in the air. "Say what you want about me and my brother, but at least I've stayed monogamous." She collects her things, Lewlyn walking past Bonnie.

Bonnie turns around in her own chair, waiting until the Head Gamemaker is far enough to make it seem to her that she's won. "I have no idea what you're talking about, Lewlyn."

The Head Gamemaker turns around, making a _tsk-tsk_ noise with her tongue. "Bonnie, when will you ever learn? Rennie doesn't lie," she straightens her back, the light in her eyes dissipating into a fiery rage. "If I find out you're still trying to force yourself onto my brother again..." Lewlyn clenches her fist, veins popping in and out of the skin, "I'm going to break your neck."

With that happy and cheery note, Lewlyn turns on her heel, walking back into the elevator.

Whatever bravado is in Bonnie's head dissolves, the words on her tongue dissipating, she overcome with a chill.

The chess board has changed, and she doesn't like how the new game is being played.

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #17: Impressing the Devil, and yep, the private training sessions end up being a 10k chapter, which might end up being one of many if I'm not too careful - Chapter 20, and 23 are probably going to reach this length as well - but I am just happy to have it all written. So, who were your favorite tribute training sessions, and did they help influence any of ya'lls opinions on them? My favorites - which is just purely me liking the session, nothing necessarily about the tribute - were all the Careers, Linden, Peri, Galiant, Colt, and Annabellina.**

 **It also looks like there's some dangerous plays being made in terms of the Capitol storyline with Lewlyn and Bonnie... perhaps our Head Gamemaker is trying to let go of her demons, and Bonnie is unsure whether any exist inside her soul or not? I'll say that I am really enjoying writing these chapters, and I cannot believe the bloodbath is almost here... _just_ six chapters away now!**

 **The next chapter, Chapter #18: Heaven's Gilded Gate, is going to be another tribute centric chapter with four returning P. - remember, everyone tribute wise gets two before the bloodbath - and I am excited for what lies beyond. Please review, you guys! You guys are amazing submitters for this, and your comments and opinions really help! Don't forget to check out the forum on this story as well for further discussion, speculation, and more. Love you all so much! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	18. Heaven's Gilded Gate (Score Reveal)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #18: Heaven's Gilded Gate. So, last chapter was gargantuan size (10k ya'll, woohoo!) which dealt with the tribute training private sessions, and I wanted to make sure I got every tribute included instead of just picking a random group, as I want there to be no favoritism between me and these tributes, as they're all amazing characters in some way, shape or form. I stayed as well as I could in guidelines with the training score requests I gave you guys (whether it be 1-4, 5-8, 9-12) and then based that off of what you guys wanted them to do for the session, which I tried more or less to stick to, but I wanted to make sure to give these tributes added character - looking at you Galiant - and I am just happy it's done. Enjoy a much shorter than 10k chapter, #18: Heaven's Gilded Gate.**

* * *

 ** _Corvus Raynott: District 6 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

He is having the best time of his life right now. Lowelle is pacing the room, he lying on the couch, looking up at her, the way she is fuming so hot that steam seems to be evaporating from her ears. Corvus laughs. His session went fine, he thinks, but he doesn't know fully and he isn't going to try and sit there on this couch and tell the world that he's done a tremendous job. It isn't in his DNA, to brag, and he knows it never will be.

What he wants to do is dig inside Lowelle's mind and find out what makes her tick. He's seen the way she parades around the apartment, shoulders back, head high, and there isn't anything wrong with being confident, he knows that, but there's a point to it where the confidence turns into arrogance. How Lowelle struts around, nose in the air, as if she has every single tribute planned out... and the way she storms in, he bursts out laughing. He finishes before she does, due to the alphabetical closeness of their last names, and it is appeasing to sit there and discuss what they did, since he is curious, but it looks like she's a hornets nest that will explode if provoked.

"So..." he starts off, sliding in the words like he's diving into the scene on ice. "How'd it go?"

"Terrible!" Lowelle shouts, stomping her foot, her right hand clutched around the diary, around the notebook. He's taken the time to read it, as there isn't anything personal in there, such as her crushes, or her likes and dislikes, but it is all notes on the competition. Every Career gets two pages dedicated to them, the outlier tributes that Lowelle perceives to be a threat have a page and a half, and the rest are given a page. _Often times it is the ones we underestimate that surprise us the most._ "They didn't even give me the time of day to talk about my findings!"

Part of Corvus wants to call her insane, and there is a certain understanding to it, but Lowelle is on the right path, that he believes. She just happens to be going about it all the wrong way, heading in the opposite direction. Learning everyone's weaknesses before making allies, Corvus thinks, means that you're not going to be satisfied with who you pick. Making allies with people just _because,_ that's a completely upside down story.

He's watched too, while sword fighting and taking spearheads to the shins as he ducks underneath combative swings in the melee training ring; he's seen the competition, and they're all there, in one way or form. What people make a lack of in strength in, such as shooting a bow and arrow, cover up with via their intelligence, and he's seen Lowelle's brilliance step through when designing these plans of getting tributes into traps... but it is the very select few that can collide their strength and their intelligence into one that makes them ultimately terrifying. That'd be the Career Valencia Shale, from District 1. He knows who his vote is reserved for, if she somehow doesn't die beforehand... but he is being honest here, if any Career is to die in the bloodbath, it is either her district partner Marcus, or the girl from Four, Maisey, with her lack of weapon experience.

"Did they dismiss your findings?" Ever since their confrontation in the kitchen two days ago, Corvus realizes that he needs to take a step back and humor her. He isn't going to ally with her straight away; he's thought of that and he's sticking to that plan. Out of all the tributes - it is a thought that comes to him when he's lying awake in the middle of the night, looking at the ceiling - that Corvus wishes to ally with, it'd be Linden Hazel, from District 7. He's seen the kid, wiry in frame... he's seen that kid pick up a knife and turn a dummy to ribbons. He also admits, blushing, that the kid is beyond cute, but there isn't a place for love in the arena, and he's sure there'll never be a place for it. If he allies with Lowelle in the end, it means he's out of options.

"Yes, they did," Lowelle seems to calm down some, taking a seat. "They wouldn't even listen to me."

"I told you that you were going about it the wrong way."

"No, you didn't say that," she looks at him, her gaze piercing through him like a lazer. "You called me stupid, said I was going to die, and then proceeded to walk out to go train. That wasn't the same thing."

"I-" Corvus goes to defend himself, sitting up somewhat, but then a procession of trumpet fanfare comes from the TV screen, scaring him half to death.

Replacing the noise, which begins to quell down, is the face of the Master of Ceremonies, Pollux Aetos. Corvus's mouth begins to water, staring at the Interviewer's glossy face, the way his eyes sparkled on camera... his palms begin to sweat. In just a few hours, a few short hours, he's going to be on stage with that man, in his presence, in his gorgeous presence and inhaling his scent. Corvus shifts on the couch some, readjusting his pants, a sudden tightness in the waistline getting noticeable. Lowelle purses her lips, she observing him, _always_ observing him, but she doesn't say anything.

"Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen, Panem. I am Pollux Aetos, your Master of Ceremonies, and as you know, today is the eve of the Hunger Games. Over the last three days, our tributes for the 100th Hunger Games, the 4th Quarter Quell," Corvus notices the way his Adam's apple sinks, lowering in and in, and he wants to take a bite out of the Big Apple, he exhaling happily, "Were watched and monitored by the Gamemakers in these three days of careful evaluation. It has culminated today, after each tribute performed for our Head Gamemaker, Lewlyn Davis, to where they were evaluated in a private session, and in this session, to be given a score that ranges through 1-12. Here are the tribute scores now..."

Lowelle clicks her pen, pulling out her notebook, flipping up to the page of where she wrote down everyone's name. Corvus looks over at her, thinking for a second about perhaps heading over, but he doesn't. He doesn't get up, and he's okay with it. He'll keep track of the scores and who got what in his head. However, it is proving to be exacerbating, a difficult task, since his eyes flit down to Pollux's lips. Corvus wonders what they must taste like, to kiss them. Cherry? The lingering taste of wine? An exotic taste to be sure.

An example as to why he needs to win the Hunger Games. If he wins, he could have Pollux's lips to look forward to. The tightness down below gets even tighter.

 _Marcus Pharadane: 9 - Nine_

 _Valencia Shale: 11 - Eleven_

 _Persephone Castor: 8 - Eight_

 _Milor Drusus: 10 - Ten_

 _Rochelle Pascal: 3 - Three_

 _Deacon Fincher: 4 - Four_

 _Carrion Bastion: 8 - Eight_

 _Maisey Rovneay: 7 - Seven_

 _Annabellina Circuit: 6 - Six_

 _Edwin Bishop: 4 - Four_

 _Lowelle Sable: 5 - Five_

 _Corvus Raynott: 7 - Seven_

 _Peri Florence: 5 - Five_

 _Linden Hazel: 8 - Eight_

 _Marina Penweather: 2 - Two_

 _Galiant Rushmohone: 3 - Three_

 _Marissa Herdier: 5 - Five_

 _Blake Hanley: 5 - Five_

 _Victoria Armstrong: 9 - Nine_

 _Hero Slade: 8 - Eight_

 _Caiden Grove: 7 - Seven_

 _Alexandra Quinn: 6 - Six_

 _Colt Sheppard: 6 - Six_

 _Gaia Whisp: 4 - Four_

Pollux pats the papers down on the desk he is sitting at, nodding at the cameras, and then the screen goes black.

Corvus leans back up against the cushions of the couch. A seven... he frowns at that. He should be higher. The good news is that he scores just as high as the lowest Career, with Maisey's seven as well. He looks over at Lowelle, his district partner sitting there, hands frozen, she having not actually even writing anything down. Her mouth is open, and she looks at him. He can't lie and say he isn't impressed that she scores a five.

"I thought you said you didn't get to do anything for them."

"I- I didn't..." Lowelle stutters, shifting somewhat, holding the sides of the couch. "I read about a page and a half about strategy, went to go and read more about the edible plants... and then I was cut off," she rubs her arms. "I got mad at Bonnie, as she's the one that interrupted my reading. Lewlyn asked for a copy of my notebook, which someone readily got handed to her," Lowelle looks off, down at her feet. She is six people higher, Corvus realizes with a smile, and then his smile widens, as he's the eleventh technical highest scoring tribute.

"I can deal with a seven," he rationalizes. "I think I deserve an eight, but I don't know anymore."

She looks back at her notebook, almost stunned. "I think I need to make some alliance changes. Whatever Linden Hazel is on, I want. District 10 too."

"We saw Hero and Victoria," Corvus notes, nodding, trying to remember the duo and their absolute badass fighting technique. "I'm sure, with an eight and a nine, the Careers are going to want to gobble them up," he begins counting on his fingers. "Maisey, Carrion, and Persephone all scored like them... they deserve to be there."

Lowelle is unable to bring her eyes to meet his. "You should be with them."

"Why do you say that?"

"You scored a seven like Maisey. I'd say that gives you a spot. You're probably stronger than her..." she looks down at her notebook. "I wrote you off as weak when we first met, on the train. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that."

Corvus isn't paying attention to her necessarily, but to what she is saying. Weakness. _Weakness._ It is a word that sends shivers down his spine, chills running all throughout his hands, and there's a tartness in the back of his mouth, a smoky smell that fills his nostrils. He looks over at Lowelle, letting out a gasp. "Misunderstood," he rasps.

She jars away from his voice, furrowing her eyebrows. Lowelle looks at him this time. "What?"

"That's what I feel like I am," Corvus says. "Misunderstood."

His district partner shifts how she is sitting on the couch, the leather bringing out the color of her hair. "If you don't mind me asking... how did you become so strong? You broke a glass with your bare hands..."

He expects the question to get tossed around somewhere, at some point, and everything goes dark. Corvus shudders, remembering it as if it is just yesterday this occurs, and there will forever be a lingering sense of fright as he closes his eyes, as he shuts a door, as he stands near the orange wisps of a flame. _Fire_. The smoke is too great, he is unable to see, and Corvus's house is burning down around him. His parents are screaming for help on the other side of his bedroom door, banging, _banging_ away, but a bookshelf falls over due to structural collapse from the floor above them, and Corvus is trapped in his room.

Corvus is tugging at the bookcase, trying to move it out of the way; he's nine, and he's terrified, and he is going to die. The smoke is making the roof turn to cinders, ashes falling onto the floor and collecting. He is breathing it all in, as he pushes against the bookshelf, it unable to move, he too weak to even try and move his bed out of the way to jump out the window.

The world goes hazy, his eyes roll into the back of his head, and it is his older sister that breaks down the door with an axe from a next door neighbor's, dragging Corvus out into the world. The amber flames lick the sidewalk, ensnaring the emerald waves of grass, and all he sees is the murky depths of death; behind his eyes is the burning façade of his world, the sounds of his struggling, and the feeling of shame in his veins.

When Lowelle asks him her question again, he snaps out of it.

"What?"

"I asked how you got managed to get so strong," she pauses. "If you want to share, that is."

Corvus swallows heavily, hugging himself tight. He's unsure, always on the look out, in case a fire happens to randomly pop up. "It was late one night at home, and I'm sleeping. It was about six years ago or so. My entire family is asleep, and one of the outlets in our house blew a fuse, creating a kitchen fire," he rubs a hand down his leg, and the touch is reminiscent to the flames that rip up and eat the curtains, bits of velvet dotting in with the soot and ash. "My parents smell smoke and by the time they do, the house is falling apart. Our house was two stories," he is looking at the beyond as he speaks, Lowelle's face drooping with sadness. "And my bedroom was on the first floor. Part of the room above my head falls into mine due to the roof burning, knocking over a bookcase of mine that blocks the door. My parents are trying to reach me from the other side, but I can't move the bookshelf... I was too weak," tears begin to spill down his cheeks. "My house is burning around me and I am about to die in there because I wasn't strong enough to make my own escape..." he squeezes his eyes shut, taking an inhale, a shaky breath that rocks his entire frame. "Ever since then, in case I get put into a situation that simply involves strength... I wasn't going to be unprepared again. I began to work out, to get physically fit, and now it has brought me here..." he looks at her, face grim.

Lowelle removes the hand from her mouth after a moment, then hurriedly grabs her pen. "I- uh, I'm sorry..."

He reaches over and grabs her wrist. "Don't," Corvus instructs.

"Don't do what?" Lowelle looks at him, a bit of fear in her eyes.

"Don't rewrite my page. Leave it as it is."

"Why?" For all the smartness Lowelle Sable is fabled to possess, as Corvus has heard, this is turning out to be nearly as difficult as putting lipstick on a pig.

"Let the rest think I am some simpleton. Let them think that. Let the rest think you aren't capable or strong," Corvus grins. "And when it comes time, we blow past everyone," he lets go of the arm he grabbed for, extending the other hand. "Allies, Lowelle?"

"Allies," she returns the shake, grinning likewise.

District 6 is not going to be overlooked, and Corvus is ready to make it clear that the next victor of the Hunger Games is coming to come from them.

Precisely, _him._

* * *

 ** _Annabellina Circuit: District 5 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

 _"I told you we should've killed one of the trainers in there!" Abe screams at the top of his lungs._ Annabellina downs to one knee in her bedroom, she having locked herself away from the world after running back upstairs in a haste. She is coaxed out of the room by Edwin, he staying in a hidden crevice of the door, unmoving, but there's a fear behind his eyes, one she notices, one that makes her heart fall. " _Then we would've gotten a twelve, and we'd be better than every Career, and no one would say anything bad about Abe Circuit ever again!"_

She hugs her knees tight, getting up against the wall, biting down on her lip. If Abe chooses to do so, she'll continue biting away until there is nothing there. Sitting on the couch with her mentors, with Edwin constantly looking at her, she senses jealousy. She scores higher than him, by not just one point, but _two_ , and Annabellina reads his mind all because the facial expressions are there. He's jealous and upset that the wacko, that the _nut_ of the tributes somehow outperforms the next Albert Einstein. It is all the more telling when Edwin returns to his room first, asking the Avoxes to bring his dinner to his room so he can eat in silence.

" _That'd have gotten Annabellina killed," Anna chastises the rage inside, pressing a hand up against Abe's shoulder. "You don't want to die, do you? Neither does she. None of us do."_

 _"Besides, think about it on the bright side," Elli chirps up, sitting in the corner, a girlish grin on her face. "We scored higher than 58.3% of everyone else... and that means 41.7%, or ten of the tributes, did worse than us. Least we aren't like them."_

 _"Well, we also scored lower than every Career too..." Lina retorts, looking up, her face rather down and dejected, somewhat demure, and there isn't a speck of happiness._

 _"Who cares?" Belle interrupts, placing a hand underneath her chin, eyes glossed over, dreaminess reflecting in her diamond gaze. "I danced beautifully for the Gamemakers and the president's wife. That's how we got the six, my dancing."_

 _"As if, slut," Lina snaps back._

 _"Trash!"_

 _"Tramp!"_

 _"Ladies!" Anna and Elli both stand up, Abe getting excited, but as per usual, he is not allowed to have any fun and he slumps back against the wall. Anna pushes her hair behind her ears, keeping both Lina and Belle apart from ripping each other to pieces. She does not paid enough to deal with these two, but again, she isn't even getting paid. "Look, we all worked together to get the six that we received. Yes, we can do better. That better will be us winning the Hunger Games."_

 _"Then let me do it," Abe rejoins the conversation, smiling. "We could win at the Cornucopia."_

 _"No," Anna looks back at him, sneering. A sudden change in personality; Anna never sneers. "You'd make us all run headlong into the end of a spear or something, all because you saw about a kill. We all need to work together if we're going to help Annabellina win the Games. We can't get into each other's way."_

Oh how she hopes. She isn't quite to sure if it is Belle or Elli's optimism that brings the smile to Annabellina's face. She looks at herself in the mirror opposite her, as she rocks up against the wall, thoughts processing nothing and everything at the same time. It is the bruised and bloodied knuckle that comes from Abe slamming it against the wall. It is the razor sharp cuts that dot the wrists and make quilts out of scarlet in which Lina spends her time. It is the tired eyes that Annabellina has since Elli is running rampant in her head, trying to find a new book to read, to perhaps garner strategy. It is her headaches that Anna gives, strategizing, breaking pencils and ripping pieces of paper apart. It is her skin, scrubbed raw and tinted a dark, terrifying pink as Belle wishes to look beautiful, far more beautiful than any piece of jewelry that riches could buy her.

Annabellina is not feeling herself, but she's never felt like herself, even when her companions make their way into her life, even when there isn't the arguments, or her sudden bloodlust, or the sudden want to spread her legs, or the sudden desire to go leaping off of the highest building... they're only perpetuating the problem.

 _Anna pinches the bridge of her nose. "Regardless, tonight, we need to be the best we can be. We're impressing the entire country tonight to root for us. That won't happen with us squabbling around like a bunch of harpies," she bites on the inside of her cheek. "On the same token, I know that none of us besides Belle can charm an audience. Belle?" the leader turns to the other girl, she checking herself out with her hands. "You can lead tonight."_

 _The girl smiles pleasantly. "It is about time you started noticing my contribution to team."_

 _"Besides your big ass and boobs?" Abe mutters underneath his breath._

 _"I won't resort to name calling," Belle sniffs the air with a disdained quality to her action. Then, a pause. "Jezebel."_

 _"But Jezebel is a woman's name-" Elli interjects._

 _"She just called you the devil!" Lina shouts in Abe's direction._

 _Abe's face twists into that of a snarl. "Oh? So you think I can't help us? You want a piece of me, Belle?"_

 _"You see anything resembling cleavage, you fall apart," Belle looks up and down at him. Not impressive. Abe has never been impressive._

 _"Guys-" Anna tries to interject._

 _"That's it!" Abe screams. "I'm going to separate your spine from your skull!"_

 _"NO!" Anna yells out in fright, trying to run forward._

Annabellina goes launching off of the wall, hitting her bed. She groans, before picking up a hand and slapping herself in the face. "Get out of my head!" she screams at herself. "Get out!" A sucker punch lands itself in her stomach, causing the girl to hit her head on the wall, groaning in pain. Belle is shrieking, Abe trying to strangle the poor girl, Lina, Anna, and Elli all desperately trying to wrench Abe off. Annabellina sees stars, lifting her hands up, they wrapping around her throat.

She squeezes, _squeezes, squeezes..._ black dots begin to appear in her vision.

"Annabellina! Annabellina, stop!" a male voice that isn't Abe's breaks through, Annabellina opening her eyes. It's Edwin, her district partner running into the room, latching onto her hands, trying to remove her hands from her neck. "Annabellina, it's me! It's Edwin! Stop! Let go!"

Everything goes lax, Anna ripping the two away, and she stays there, Abe collapsed on the floor, Belle holding a hand to her throat. Annabellina looks over at Edwin, and the moment they lock eyes, she bursts into tears, throwing her arms around him in a hug, sobbing into his neck.

"They won't go away!" she cries, making a choked breath. "I can't get them out of my head!"

"It's okay, it's okay..." Edwin soothes her, holding her head close to his chest, he rubbing her head soothingly.

 _Abe sulks in the corner, looking down at his hand, curling it into a fist._

 _From that fist comes a blade peeking through the flesh._

 _No more games._

 _There's only one way Annabellina Circuit is winning these Hunger Games._

 _Through fire and blood._

* * *

 ** _Marcus Pharadane: District 1 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

Valencia pinches the bridge of her nose, hanging her head down, and wishes to be anywhere else in the world right now. "Marcus, you need to calm down."

"No!" shouts the Career from District 1. "I am not going to calm down!" He marches back over to the TV screen. "What Lewlyn and Bonnie did to me was _bullshit!_ Absolute bullshit! I did not deserve a nine. I am the best archer they've ever seen; I deserve a twelve! I deserve to be the highest, not her," he says, throwing his hands in Valencia's direction. His district partner sits up, leering her eyes like a snake.

"Excuse me?" she retorts, her face in a distortion of disbelief.

"No offense," Marcus adds a bit softer.

"I earned my eleven, thank you very much," Valencia stands up, crossing her arms over her chest. "The only reason why I didn't score a twelve is because I wasn't perfect. No one ever is perfect anyways. I saw the way Madam Rodney looked at me and I knew she liked what I did, but even then I didn't get the highest you can get because I'm not perfect," she calms herself down a bit, swallowing heavily for emphasis. "It'd be best you decide to take a bit of that into account."

"It just isn't fair," he complains.

Valencia makes a telling face, a grin, and he's sure that she thinks she's caught him up in something. "Hey, now, you start calling things unfair, and that opens up an entirely different can of worms."

He is not going to change his mind, no matter _what_ Valencia says. He knows her angle, how she wants to revolutionize everything and not be the same old sex symbol for the district purely because it works. Marcus also has a lot of common sense to know that his district partner, who is inevitably now his biggest competition - he mindfully skips over Milor's score; he's irrelevant right now. He probably took his shirt off in front of them - is not going to get to accomplish any of what she wants to do, because she is going to die, and maybe at the hands of one his perfect arrows.

Wait.

He forgot.

Marcus hasn't fired a single arrow at someone, and here he is wanting to win the Hunger Games. He isn't so sure who is more insane for their goals, he or Valencia. However, what his confident district partner doesn't know won't hurt her. He is only focusing now on what he can do to improve. Marcus Pharadane isn't like the others from the rest of the districts, especially Four, who think they have the competition wrapped up in a neat and nice bow, silvery and all. There's real stakes now, where the things he will fire arrows at will fire back at him.

Valencia makes his way over to him, he now standing in front of the windows, staring out into the brightness of the Capitol. It is beautiful outside, but here he is cooped up inside this glass prison on the bottom floor, unable to run free and experience the truth, to see the wonder. He hasn't seen the president since the tribute parade, the man who fills him with hope, the man who fills with instability and the idea that he can do great things, the idea that he _is_ doing great things.

"Besides, I thought you've never killed anyone. The greatest archer in the country isn't the greatest if he can't actually kill his enemies," she points out, standing by him, crossing her arms likewise to him.

Marcus gives her a sly eye. "I'm sure you haven't swung your sword at a real person with the intent to kill either," his tone gets into a more menacing area. "You shouldn't be one to talk."

"My problem isn't like yours. I'm prepared to see all the guts and the gore," Valencia proclaims triumphantly, a bit of it ruined by the fact he is much greater than her in height. That makes him snort; it is as if he is a giant looking down at a peasant, at a common folk, a boot to an ant and he is going to crush her and everyone else who gets in his way alike.

He rubs his arms, moving away from the window. "I think we should split from them."

Valencia follows his movements with her eyes. "What do you mean?"

"From Two and Four," Marcus turns, his eyes brightening immensely. He _likes_ this idea. He knew from the beginning that Valencia is a threat, ever since they're picked by the amazing Kevia and Lance, victors extraordinaire. "Let's abandon Milor and Persephone and Maisey and Carrion. We scored higher than three of them. Maisey can't use a weapon for shit, Carrion's anger gets in the way, and Persephone's totally clueless! We could target them during the bloodbath and get them out of the way..." the more he talks about it, the more he likes the idea. "You and I together could get rid of Milor."

She rubs her arms, frowning. If Marcus is loving this idea, which he is, she _isn't._ "Marcus, I don't like the sound of that so early in the arena. We always split up, we have to, I know... but that's backstabbing them. That's betraying allies we have always had, and you just want to upend it all?"

"I thought you wanted to break the wheel," he taunts her, crossing his arms over his chest. "To become the best Career in the world."

"Not like that, though," Valencia shudders. "Not by cheating."

"Cheating?" Marcus's voice rises a few octaves. "We're already cheaters since we've been training for the Games our whole lives!"

"You know what I mean," she snaps. "Dishonesty! That isn't usually the Career way."

He cannot believe what he says next, but since he is already this deep in thinking crazy talk, in _being_ a lunatic, he might as well take the full plunge. "Doesn't matter what you think, Valencia..." he shrugs. "I might just break off anyways, with or without you."

It is as if there is a glitch in a computer system after he says this. Valencia's face contorts into confusion, she bringing her eyebrows together. He knows why this is happening; he's always known. She's not used to things getting the better of her, for things going off the plan she creates, and he is more than happy to fulfill that void. "What did you say? You'd do it solo?"

"I could," Marcus assures her.

She lifts her head up some, a glare replacing the general confused look on her face. "You know, since I got the highest score, they're going to follow me, Marcus. Follow what _I say._.." Valencia gets up in her district partner's face. "You go it alone, I am going to take all five of us, and whoever else we might get, whether it be District 10, or that boy from Seven... we're going to hunt you down."

He places a hand on her shoulder, as patronizing as he could make it. Marcus leans down, leans in close, whispering into her ear.

"I'd like to see you try..."

With that, Marcus turns on his heel, heading into his bedroom. He doesn't know about her, frankly he doesn't quite care at this point, and he sure as hell doesn't care what the rest of the Careers are thinking or doing... all he knows is that he is going to be the victor, one way or another.

Valencia glares in his direction, her jaw locked, she stuck in a rut of disbelief.

He knows that the look of surprise on her face will be there all the same when he fires an arrow into her brain.

* * *

 ** _Victoria Armstrong: District 10 Female P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

She returns Hero's high-five, hugging him after that, she withdrawing a few moments later. There's a huge grin on her face, his even larger if that is possible, but they're over the moon. A nine? A nine. Victoria cannot believe what Pollux just said, she looking over at Hero with a manic grin, already clapping for his eight, and then the bombshell is dropped. Even Arizona, even Hector, their victors, their mentors... Arizona got a six, Hector a seven, and now both of them have catapulted over the top.

"Why do you think we weren't higher?" Hero asks somewhat after the initial excitement wears off. "I know for certain you and I did a banged up job."

"It'd have to be our age," she garners. Victoria doesn't want to admit it, since she knows he has a bit of a complex when it comes to, as what Hero calls it, 'underperforming' - that's a thought that makes her snicker, and he is certainly not an underperformer - which, if she admits that she wishes she got a higher score as well, it'll only validate his concerns. She needs to learn how to take what is given to her and make the best of it. "The Careers are all seventeen or eighteen and they did great, so it is our age. After all, Madam Rodney was in the room. She might've had a say."

"Why was she in there anyways?" her district partner wonders aloud.

Victoria is thinking the same thing as well, having had gone first and all, which is already a nerve-wracking experience. She wishes to have gone last, to be a much bigger impression than that poor District 12 Gaia, who looks like she might fall apart at any minute, but there's nothing she can do about it now. Victoria remembers, as it is only just a few hours ago after all, the way Bonnie looks at her, as if the president's wife is going to jump down from the balcony right then and there and fight her. Victoria Armstrong is capable of winning that fight easily.

She shrugs as her answer. "I dunno. I hope it helped us," as she says this, Hero's façade drops just a bit, he looking away, locking his jaw, the sparkle in his eyes disappearing somewhat, a dimming, dying star. _You're gonna have to kill him, you know. No matter what, he is going to die because of it. To get home..._ she shudders, instead standing up to him a bit more. "Hero, what's wrong?"

He shakes his head, keeping his lips together in a wry smile. "I wish I got a higher score. I feel like I put in a lot more work to get just an eight."

" _Just_ an eight?" Victoria repeats, furrowing her eyebrows. She places a hand on his cheek, turning him to look at her, diamond eyes seizing diamond eyes with electricity in their souls. "Listen to me, Hero Slade. You scored higher than Maisey, and she's a Career. You scored on the same level as Persephone _and_ Carrion, and they're also Careers. We saw how strong Carrion is... and that means Lewlyn and Bonnie thought you were so good to be ranked with them. You are not going to be self-doubting right now."

It takes her a second for Victoria to realize how close to his face she is, he even having licked his lips in sort of some anticipation. She looks at him in the eyes for a moment, fear replacing the boldness a second ago, but Hero seems to be trying to look anywhere else except at her face. She moves back, setting her shoulders, realizing how cold his face is, finger tips chilled.

"Thank you..." he whispers.

"You're welcome."

Hero opens his mouth to say something back when the elevator stops at their floor, dinging off in the corner, cutting him off. Victoria immediately gets in a defensive position, as neither Arizona or Hector are anywhere in the building, they're down mingling in the Capitol with the victors from Districts 1 and 2 trying to get their own pair - in which Victoria is immensely grateful that there are people fighting on their behalf - to get them into the amazing ring of Careers. So... this means, there's some random tribute or person stepping onto their floor.

Her hands gravitate over to the knife that is resting on top of the counter, they having finished eating their lunch after performing for Lewlyn and Bonnie.

She drops the knife immediately after when Milor Drusus steps into the living room, he looking about, dressed handsomely, his hair slicked down to his head. His eyes light up when he catches sight of them.

"Ah, there you are! Victoria, Hero, my name is-"

"Milor Drusus," Hero chokes on his saliva. "Yeah, we uh... we know who you are."

Victoria feels all exposed all of a sudden. Milor claps his hands together, getting straight to the point. "Listen, the rest of the Careers and I were talking, and after some discussion, we decided that we want you both to join the Careers."

She looks at Hero, and he looks at Victoria, and they nod simultaneously. "We'll do it." They both say it together, freakishly rather.

Milor grins, and his shoulders settle down some. "Then, that's good news. Besides, I think you two will do great filling in our empty spot."

Victoria raises an eyebrow. "Empty spot? What do you mean?"

The Career from District 2's face drops some, his eyebrows pent up together in an expelling of frustration. "Marcus has decided to go alone. We're down a member, making our normal numbers only five. With you two, seven. Not ideal, a perfect eight would be best, but personally, Marcus was going to hold us down." He extends his hand to Victoria, clearly she resembling the voice of reason here. "Allies?" he asks.

She shakes his hand back even heartier. "Allies."

Victoria grins to herself. This is going to be too easy.

District 10 gets a glimpse of heaven's gilded gate.

* * *

 **Well, there we are ladies and gentlemen! That was Chapter #18: Heaven's Gilded Gate, the revealing of the training scores, and I hope you guys are satisfied with them! So, Corvus and Lowelle have connected, Annabellina is freaking dying over here, Marcus has left the group chat, while our District 10 pair of Hero and Victoria will be picking up Pharadane's slack... and I'll say that there's so much more to come.**

 **Next chapter, Chapter #19: Siblings in Death, is another Capitol character centric chapter, and it will be the last one until Chapter 24, which is the aftermath of the bloodbath, which is Chapter 23, so we're getting there. Please review and let me know what you thought! Interested to find out, as I am super sure opinions are shifting... and I can't wait. Thank you all so much for being amazing readers! Love you all! Have a great day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	19. Siblings in Death (Capitol Plot III)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #19: Siblings in Death. This is going to be the last of the Capitol chapters before the start of the Hunger Games, as the bloodbath is approaching folks, the 23rd chapter after all... and that means we gotta hold onto these tributes. Last chapter was the revealing of the tribute scores, alliances shifted, and tensions are high. I am excited for the next foray into this SYOT, but first we gotta get through to this remarkable Training stuff. Enjoy Chapter #19: Siblings in Death.**

* * *

 ** _Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis P.O.V_**

* * *

She smothers out her skirt, a sleeveless white and black frilly piece that goes down to about her knees, hair tucked back behind her ears, and the weight of the world falling down on her shoulders. Lewlyn has no idea why she's here, but it doesn't matter anymore; there's things that she needs to get off of her chest, and the way Bonnie has been speaking about these certain things, and how Rennie approaches her just a few hours ago with his tablet... she cannot sit back any longer.

The Head Gamemaker raises her fist to the door, rapping her knuckles on it, squeezing her eyes shut. God, she hopes he's home. It's Interview Night, and he's probably recovering from already revealing the tribute scores. Bonnie does not influence her thinking, and she's glad that the president's wife isn't a part of it. Lewlyn needs to bathe tonight anyways, take a bath that is as long as it is dreamy, to scrub the filth of the viper off of her skin. She cannot take it, the lying, the nagging, the hand shakes that are done with lax force.

Back to the present thought, Lewlyn licks her lips. It is strange, that she's the one now approaching _his_ level, his domain, his realm, and she's nervous. She likes to think they were friends, once upon a time, even when he drinks mint juleps on her balcony, putting his feet up on the railing, but when Rennie comes back to her room a few hours ago, sobbing his eyes out, bruises lacerating his throat and back, a fiery rage consumes her. However, instead of going in guns ablazing, she'll be the pretty little daffodil that he expects, the one with the anger management problems has to be left at home.

The sound of the lock being twisted the other way around comes from the other side of the door, and it is wrenched open. Standing in his own bathrobe, tooth brush in his mouth - she thinks back to this morning and Bonnie's surprise intrusion - is Pollux Aetos, the wonderful Master of Ceremonies, and the current man screwing her brother. Or abusing her brother, if Lewlyn takes Rennie's words to be true.

He utters a noise that sounds like her name, but he holds a finger up, walking away and finishing the brushing of his teeth in the bathroom. Lewlyn stands there as complacently as she can, trying to look as non-combative as she can, although her hands want to encircle around her neck. There's the running of a sink in the background, but Lewlyn does not move from her spot. Unlike Pollux, who likes to just come and go as he pleases because apparently he owns the world - which is a newsflash to Lewlyn, as she thought that Calhoun owns the world instead - she is going to politely wait for him to return.

She is unable to help her eyes in which they narrow themselves at Pollux when he comes back into the foyer of his apartment, his long hair shaggy and uncombed, still clothed in the bathrobe. It is a big night indeed, and with only two and a half hours before showtime, she's surprised that he's still getting ready. The Pollux Aetos she knows would be hopping around by this point in his gorgeous suits, wearing those beautiful ties that accentuate the throat, eyes sparkled, face powdered... and yet he's still shoddily dressed.

Pollux throws a towel over his head, running it over his hair. "Good afternoon, Lewlyn," he greets her cheerfully.

"Afternoon," she says back, as cordially as she can without giving herself away too much. The narrowing of the eyes, as if she's a snake - she's heard the comparison a thousand times before, nothing new.

"Do you need something?" Pollux asks.

She rocks back and forth on her heels. "I need to talk to you. Can I come in?"

"Of course!" He steps back, motioning with his hands.

Lewlyn steps into the room, shutting the door behind her. Her dress is short, which she thinks about again, noticing how he looks down at her legs and then back up at her face. She tries to not make so much eye contact with him, but Pollux has this electricity to him that simply sucks her in. She can understand why her brother would be in love with a man like this, in the looks department. She sits down on the couch in the center of the living room, a decorated black and white with lovely pillows that almost resemble reflective glass.

She makes herself comfortable as she can, not wanting to be here for too long, as there's things that need to be done and intruding in on Pollux, even on behalf of Rennie, isn't something high on her list of wants. Lewlyn is only to spend enough time in his apartment for what is necessary, not to dawdle too long, and definitely not get sidetracked.

"Good work on the training scores earlier," she pipes up, shifting uncomfortably. Lewlyn's heard recently that a good tactic to be the bearer of bad news is to smother the other person receiving the storm clouds on their horizon in compliments, as if Pollux Aetos needs to hear more things positive that'll fluff his head.

"That was nothing," Pollux gaffs, he standing in his open-aired bathroom. Lewlyn notices that his bathrobe only has a front too it, and exposed just like every piece of his furniture is his ass. Her cheeks burn and flush a ripe cherry red, she looking away. _Well then..._ He takes a comb, having taken off the towel, starting to slick up his hair. "Just the usual grind and stuff," he pauses, turning to her, holding the comb in his hand, which bounces up and down as he speaks. "I have to say I am surprised you gave some of those tributes low and high scores. Linden looks tiny, yet he got an eight? Caiden and Colt don't even score with the Careers?"

Lewlyn clears her throat, not really expecting to speak on matters such as these. "Linden is a feral fighter. Colt and Caiden are gentle giants with strength that is undirected, untrained. Linden could beat both of them if the odds are truly with him."

Pollux wades into his closet, taking an outfit of a hanger that she is unable to see. When he steps back into the room, he parades it out for her to see, a glimmering and gorgeous tuxedo like the silver slivers of the moon, a matching red and white tie to go with it, and dark black pants. "Well, viola!" he exclaims cheekily. Lewlyn realizes, almost in sadness, that they're matching outfits right now. "We're doing a more lunar theme this year! I represent the umbra and the light side of the moon."

" _And your heart is darker than both sides..."_ Lewlyn thinks to herself, but she forces a smile, lips thinly pressed together as if she is biting down on a cracker. When she looks at Pollux, she sees Bonnie reflected back at her, the same distaste filling the pockets of her mouth, a sour grittiness that washes over her teeth and drills holes into her gums. "I bet you're going to look fabulous."

"I always look fabulous," Pollux says nonchalantly, laying the suit over the back of a chair. He takes a seat across from her, across a coffee table that has a few magazines, she trying to not look down at the cover which is fully displaying a naked man in a rather compromising position. "So, what was it you wanted to discuss?"

The Head Gamemaker closes her eyes for a brief second, trying to imagine her brother's face. She loves him more than anything in the world, but it has become noticeable to her, from the way everyone around her mentions it, that she's the devil to him... and looking at herself over a broken mirror, with shards of glass in her wrists, copper spilling down pale flesh, it occurs to her that she _is..._ she's the embodiment of a fiendish creature that steals and kills, and she's done it all to this redhead out of jealousy; to her _brother_ out of jealousy. Lewlyn is not going to sit there and tell anyone that Rennie's heart of gold doesn't make him have dark tendencies; he used to play the game just like she is doing now, like Bonnie is always doing, and how Calhoun seems to have slipped out of it, once radiating, shining, _handsome._

When she opens them, words already sitting on a eager tongue to speak, she is doing this for him, doing this for Rennie. If there is one thing she does good in her life, it is going to be for her brother in this moment now. Lewlyn scratches at her leg, trying to make the body language more pronounced. "Did you see Rennie today?"

Pollux's demeanor changes in an instant, he leaning forward, eyes bulging out of his head. "Why? Is he in trouble?"

She raises a hand to push him back some, he nearly having launched out of his seat. "No... he's fine. Did you see him today?"

The Master of Ceremonies sits back, pursing his lips, the excitement receding away. "Yeah. He, uh, he slept over," she notices the way his voice slips down, and she is pretty sure 'slept over' meant 'slept together', but what her brother does away from her is not her business anymore, or at least Lewlyn is trying to release the control. "We said goodbye, and then he came back for lunch and we hung out..." he drops the voice again, and she knows they most definitely slept together then. That must've been when the bruises appeared. She's never known Pollux to have a temper, but anything can happen this day and age. He furrows his eyebrows. "Is something wrong?"

Lewlyn runs a hand down the end of her skirt, smothering it out. She has to face her demons, face her fears, and they're here, on her doorstep knocking and roaring. "I- I can't let you see Rennie anymore."

Pollux tilts his head to the side, stuttering out a laugh. "What?"

"You can't date my brother, Pollux," Lewlyn reiterates, a little stronger this time. The withering glare that comes from him is enough to almost make her sink back into the leather of the couch.

"It's been literally three days, Lewlyn," it looks like he goes to stand, but stops himself from moving, halfway stuck between sitting down and his legs straightening out to be upright. "I hardly believe I've done something wrong already."

She locks her jaw. "Rennie came back today after lunch covered in bruises."

" _Bruises?_ " Pollux's tone is incredulous.

"All along his neck, back, and wrists," Lewlyn swallows her hidden rage. She's never seen his body as torn up as it is when he takes off his shirt and pants, revealing every splotch of blue and yellow skin, craters and wounds that show hardiness, resilience, and damage. It is as if Lewlyn is mindfully forgetting being the one holding the pincers that keep her brother's tongue in place, with Calhoun approaching with the blade - once again, she breaks away for a second... Calhoun isn't there. Why is she interjecting the president in all these situations - but right now she's focusing on how the guy in front of her has abused her brother. "He said that you were too rough and-"

Pollux jumps to his feet, throwing aside the coffee table. "He said _what?_ That I did that to him? Lewlyn, he must've been mugged on his way back! Neither one of us were harmed!" The table goes flying, the lewd magazines go everywhere, and she's surprised there isn't the breaking of glass. For all her credit, Lewlyn stays where she's sitting.

Lewlyn shakes her head. "I'm going to believe my brother, Pollux. I'm sorry."

"He's lying," Pollux's tone is accusatory. "I wouldn't ever hurt him!"

She is going to disagree wholly on that. "Rennie doesn't lie, Pollux."

"Like hell he does."

"You can't be with him if you're going to hurt him. Rennie doesn't like being hurt," she adds the next bit with a venomous tone. "Maybe you can find someone else to be your toy, who actually doesn't mind abuse."

"Abuse? _Abuse?"_ Pollux leans in his head some, eyes burning like supernovas. He locks his jaw, locking his arms. "Lewlyn, get out of my house."

"I-"

"GET OUT OF MY _FUCKING_ HOUSE!" he roars, grabbing the nearest thing to him - a coffee mug - and throwing it at the wall. Bits and pieces of porcelain shatter everywhere on the wall, the cup empty, and this actually causes Lewlyn to flinch. How can the Master of Ceremonies sit there and say it to her face, pointe blank that he does not have anger issues, that he wouldn't possibly have it in him to hurt another human being, especially someone as demure as Rennie who no longer has the vocal capabilities to ay he's in pain.

Lewlyn steps up as fast as she can, racing straight to the front door, steam practically evaporating off of his head. She stops at the doorframe, turning back to him. "You're not allowed to go out with Rennie anymore, Pollux. If you continue, I'm going to tell Calhoun to fire you," then, as she cannot resist the last barb. "Good luck tonight, by the way. Break a leg... and your back," she shuts the door in his face, he grabbing a second coffee mug and chucking it after she shut the door.

The Head Gamemaker straightens her shoulders out, sighing. It is a bit painful to have done that, to rip the Band-Aid clean off, but it needs to be done. Her brother already has her in his life as the one who's been channeling the abuse, and even she needs to start turning over a new leaf. If Pollux is apparently worse, as Rennie has made it out to be, she can only imagine how terrible she must've been in comparison.

* * *

 ** _The Being Who Holds His Words Behind His Teeth_**

* * *

He's enjoying the few hours he has of sunlight left before he has to eventually dredge back inside. He has no idea where he's going to go, as he no longer owns an apartment, and he's been with Lewlyn for the last couple of years... does he even want to live by himself anymore? Truth be told, this is the first time Rennie is giving it any thought, he sitting up against a beautiful fountain downtown in the Capitol, looking at the shimmering azure sky as the halcyon sun above heats his pale skin. The gentle trickling noise of the water splashing against the reflective diamond pool, and the weathered cobblestones around it is music to his ears.

It is a symphony of nature going on behind his head, he resting up against a column. Rennie Davis is at peace in this moment, having watched Pollux reveal the training scores about the tributes and their evaluations under his sister at a bar, taking down shots of gin and tonic, and if he be so bold, a few good ole sips of whiskey. He is slightly unnerved, through his third shot, when the face of Linden Hazel, the District 7 male, comes on screen, as there is an uncanny resemblance to the Avox and the tribute, not only via hair color, but facial structure, and suddenly, Rennie doesn't feel like sitting at the bar anymore.

Rennie is about to close his eyes, one hand wrapped around the tablet so he can talk to any passerby should they wish to communicate, when a loud shout from his left breaks the spell of slumber.

"Hey, asshole!" shouts a very familiar, very _recognizable_ voice, Rennie's eyes shooting open, he looking around wildly for the disturbance. He's one of maybe six or seven people actually downtown right now that isn't in some bar, or hostel, or sex shop, or _something_ , everyone else getting ready to watch the Interviews tonight, ironically done by Pollux, who happens to be the guy losing his very mind right in front of Rennie. The Avox turns to his left, and stampeding down the street, beautiful as always, hair matted down to his forehead by sweat, is Pollux Aetos.

There's only reason why the Master of Ceremonies is so upset... and that's because Lewlyn must've asked him to cut ties.

However, when Pollux reaches Rennie, the Avox standing up, but not actually regarding the man of his presence, the Interviewer grabs Rennie's sleeves of his shirt, pulling them back to reveal his wrists. A soft gasp comes from Pollux's throat, he taking a step back. Rennie looks down at his wrists, faint cerulean indentions pressed forcibly all up and down his arms, into his palms and knuckles, and even one that is starting to scab over. The two men lock eyes, Pollux gently placing a hand under the other's chin to force him to look up. Pollux swallows heavily when he sees a ribald ring of a familiar blue at the lymph nodes, and following that a ring of fire that encircles the Avox's neck.

"Rennie..." Pollux says shakily, removing his hands from the other man's body, "Who did this to you? Why did Lewlyn say _I_ did this to you?"

It is an agonizing couple of hours, Rennie has to admit, standing in a public restroom in a stall, hands wrapped around his throat as he squeezes and squeezes and squeezes, eyes bulging out of his head, his face turning purple, and the pain is starting to become unbearable, black spots filling his vision. It is a euphoric rush, Rennie turned on to the maximum point of climax, where he ends up gasping for air, shaking all over, the bruises from his hands now on his neck. He looks down, stunned that he has this physical prowess in him. It is the crowbar that he slams against his arms and legs for thirty minutes straight that bring the point home, and when Rennie looks down at his aching body, the trembling remains, and he is still sore.

He pulls out the tablet, typing away.

 _I did._

Pollux takes a step back, his facial expression distorting to that of disbelief, he shaking his head back and forth, almost making a stutter. "No... no you didn't. Someone assaulted you."

 _I hurt myself._

He cannot fully say why. He likes Pollux, and it is unfortunate that his apparent lover has to take the fall, but he knows, despite what the man will say, he is not loved in that manner by him. Pollux only loves the physical aspect, by hanging onto tandems of flesh, and biting the succulent bits, having the forbidden fruit, but Rennie can see that behind his lust-filled stare, there's an emptiness, and nothingness that Pollux is only trying to create something with. You cannot create something out of nothing, and he needs to make sure it is done in a way that is so tasteful, it cannot be just a simple saying, ' _We shouldn't be together_ '. It has to be artistic, to make a statement.

The Master of Ceremonies can clearly not comprehend what he's hearing, what he's _seeing._ "I- I don't understand," he furrows his eyebrows together, leaning in, rage starting to creep back into his voice. "You told your sister I'm the one who hurt you. You know full and well all we did today was fool around. Why would you lie to her?" He grips Rennie's wrist, hard, in fact, the Avox hissing to himself. "Why would you say that about me?"

Using his left hand, Rennie types out the next answer.

 _You wanted to kill my sister. I don't want to be with someone who'll hurt my family like that._

"Hurt your family?" Pollux practically yells. "She cut your _fucking_ tongue out of your mouth, Rennie! Five years ago! Don't you remember? And you agreed to it! You wanted to!"

 _I was just high on lust. I don't want to hurt Lewlyn._

Pollux throws his hands in the air, practically giving up at this point. "You're-" he says, but then he stops, taking a look at Rennie's outfit. Normally Avoxes wear something red, a uniform that shows they belong to this certain person, or that specific place, or this group of people... and yet Rennie isn't dressed like that. The Avox, still one for having no tongue, is wearing khaki slacks and a bright blue button-down, not a single speck of crimson anywhere clothing wise on his body. "Rennie... why aren't you in your Avox outfit? Lewlyn never lets you change out of it..."

Rennie swallows heavily. This might go really, _really_ wrong.

 _She released me from the contract just a few hours ago. I am no longer her Avox. I am no longer anyone's Avox. I am a mute Capitol citizen. I'm free._

The amount of betrayal in Pollux's voice stings, it physically hurts for Rennie to hear him say this, but sacrifices must be made, diseases must be cut out of people's lives. "She set you free? She... she _released_ you?" his face changes again to a more raging resolve. "Your sister mutilated you, forces you to have sex with her, gets in the way of our personal lives... and because she's freed you, you turn your back on me?"

 _It wasn't meant to be personal._

"Personal my ass, Rennie! You made it personal about incriminating me!"

Pollux leaps forward, grabbing Rennie by the throat, pushing the Avox up against the wall. Fingers dig into the redhead's tender neck, Rennie gasping out for air. Pollux grits his teeth, pushing, _pushing, pushing_ up until Rennie begins to kick, begins to thrash in the Master of Ceremonies arms. It is so alluring, however, he unable to help the rushing flow of blood in his veins, the excitement, the happiness that flushes throughout his entire body.

He wants to shout. _Let go of me..._ but the sound never comes.

"If Lewlyn thinks I'm such a monster, I might as well enact on that, shouldn't I?" Pollux sneers. "After all, it seems you don't have a regard for my feelings. I tried to help you, tried to _save_ you, and you stab me in the back!" He squeezes harder. "I could do it, Rennie. I could snap your neck in two and you aren't even able to stop me. What happened to your power now?" he taunts.

Rennie is grabbing at the arm holding him up. He expects Pollux to be upset... but not _this_ upset. It is all so Rennie can prove to everyone he isn't some daffodil... and the truth is never easy to reveal. The black spots begin to fill his vision, his eyes widening in panic.

Pollux turns his face to the side, taking a deep breath, releasing the Avox. Rennie collapses onto the ground, wheezing for breath, exhaling and inhaling shakily, his heart beat a complete mess. "Look at what you nearly made me do," the Interviewer sounds nearly grief-stricken. "I nearly just killed you... Rennie," it seems as if the anger is out of him, receded away and never to return. He places a hand against his head. "You made me get my suit wrinkled... the Interviews are tonight. Rennie, I don't want to see you again. Go back to your master, go back to your sister who you love so much that you allow her to screw you..." he spits at the ground. "And to think I found you to be beautiful..."

The Master of Ceremonies stalks off, probably heading over to the theater to make final preparations, he not even looking back at his lover, at his boyfriend, at the Avox currently on the ground.

Rennie sucks in the air, cold and euphoric against his ribcage, a feeling of soulfulness returning back to his body. He looks up, still taking in huge breaths, a smile playing onto his face. It worked. It actually worked. Free or not, as Lewlyn seems to be turning a new leaf, Pollux has played right into his hand, a deal no one sees coming as everyone has counted him out.

He and Lewlyn are siblings of death, meant to be together by each other's side until the end, until the _very_ end.

Rennie Davis is back in the game.

* * *

 **A smaller prelude, smaller step into the next phase of the Capitol journey. This was Chapter #19: Siblings in Death, and a chapter I was really excited for, as there have been some twists a-brewing. So... Lewlyn seems to be, since Chapter 13, and maybe even earlier, having a bit of guilt, and now Rennie is no longer her Avox. He still can't speak, which sucks, but he's not bound by her. He managed to create a further rift between Pollux and his sister, and now likewise he and Pollux... but what is our Avox garnering at? What is his point in doing all of this you think?**

 **Chapter #20: Pollux's Showdown, ladies and gentlemen, is our interview chapter! Now, I usually give tributes in this chapter a 1k-1.5k point of view. Since there are 24 tributes, I am not doing 24 sections, that will make the chapter _way_ too long. Instead, there are going to be eight points of view from eight different tributes so they can have their second point of view. The chapter will be similar length to #17... _long,_ at around 10k, maybe a bit more. I hope you guys review... as we're now four chapters away from the bloodbath. People are going to die, ya'll. **

**Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope you guys do review, I love the feedback, I love your theories, I love them all! I will see you all soon with Chapter #20: Pollux's Showdown. I love you all so much! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	20. Pollux's Showdown (Interviews)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #20: Pollux's Showdown... which sounds ominous, I know. Last chapter was the last Capitol character chapter for awhile, where Lewlyn has forced Pollux to no longer see Rennie anymore, Rennie proves that he is now in this web of lies, and he is not going down without a fight. Today, ladies and gents, is the Interview Night, and I picked at random eight tributes to have points of view from, but we're only hearing six interviews tonight... as this chapter is not going to be 24k long... more like 10k long. I hope you all enjoy Chapter #20: Pollux's Showdown.**

* * *

 ** _Colt Sheppard: District 12 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

He is experiencing cashmere for the first time. Safe to say, this is revolutionary right now. His mind is swimming with thoughts, stuck on the events that have happened over the last few days. Whenever Colt looks down at his hands, he is able to say he doesn't recognize them. These hands of his... they've held a blade. They've swung said blade _at_ something. A plastic dummy, sure, but will in he less than twelve hours time be able to then swing it at another _human?_ That thought sends chills down his spine, even while he is cloaked in a piece of heaven.

His stylist steps back, a short woman that only goes to about his armpit, she having wiry wisps of hair on the side of her head, linking back together under her glasses, almost like a pretzel, and Colt is trying so hard to be respectful. Her name is Villianna, and he is done from then on trying to pronounce it, as she gives him the freedom to say 'Vill' instead, if she's feeling generous. She does her best though, in regards to his height, she needing a ladder, not just a step stool, to measure his shoulders one last time. He swallows, tilting his head to the side.

Despite Villianna being as sweet as she can be in a situation as terrible as this, her mind halfway in a rut between feeling sorry for him and pleased to watch more tributes to die, it only makes Colt's heart fill with despair. He hears them, he hears _everyone,_ Careers, the other tributes, and even at times, Gaia behind his back. They're all scared of him, for some reason, and he knows that is only because of his bulk. Colt is pretty sure that he is floundering around the training center the last two days with a sword, trying to actually hit things, and it takes - it is so embarrassing to even think about - him being yelled at by Capitol authority to even swing his sword when it comes to performing.

He is no villain, certainly no foe. Just someone who is afraid of the consequences of killing. He's heard it said, he's heard from gossip via their victor and the rest that they're unable to get the faces of those they killed out of their mind, faces always pictured behind closed eyes like distortions, nightmares that don't even play out in their head... still frames that only have to exist when they disarm someone.

There's a knock on his bedroom door, he inside trying to practice the very art form of swinging a club, as Colt thinks there might be some rhyme or reason to perhaps using a weapon meant to debilitate, but not wound or kill. A club seems to be a good idea. He moves his arms too fast, foot slipping, and he crashes onto the ground quite hard, a ruckus he is sure everyone from Floor 11 to the first floor can hear.

The knock follows a few moments later, and when he opens it, there's Valencia Shale of District 1 standing in front of him, fist raised as if she is going to knock again.

"Valencia!" he exclaims in surprise. He's probably only said a hundred words, maybe even less, the whole time he's been here.

She nods her head, extending out her hand, which he heartily shakes - his mother raised him to be man with values, to always treat a lady with respect. She never said what to do when said lady may come after you with a sickle just a day from now, but he'll worry about that when he gets to it - and Valencia gives a nice smile. "A man who has manners," Valencia points out. "I hardly ever see that."

"Can I help you?" Colt crosses his arms, hopefully in a non-combative way, as the last thing he needs is all six Careers on his ass for pissing them off. He may be able to take one down if he grows the courage to do so, but six at a time is a death wish.

The Career raises her eyebrows. Perhaps there's a speech she has in mind, but it seems that he cuts to the chase, cuts the cheese, and a twinkle glows in her eyes. She clears her throat, straightening herself out in the door frame. "Because I got the highest training score, I'm leading the Careers in the arena. Milor has asked the District 10 tributes if they want to join, Persephone is asking Linden from District 7... and I am here to ask you if you want to join."

There is a record playing inside Colt's head that comes to a jerking, halting stop, vocal notes dispersing out into the world like hazy waves of static. He gives a light little laugh, about to ask if Valencia is joking, but by the ways of her facial expression, which is furrowed in eyebrows, an eyebrow raised, clearly expecting an answer, she isn't kidding. His mouth goes dry. "I- uh, Valencia, I'd..." he frowns. "Wait. I got a six. I am pretty sure that doesn't speak fantastically into Career standards."

"You're one point below Maisey," Valencia points out. "She's the one in the alliance I myself am watching out for as she's unpredictable," she gives him a good look over. "I saw how you trained, and you have amazing potential. Perhaps all you need is me to help draw it out of you."

" _Draw it out of me and then end up killing me,"_ Colt thinks darkly to himself, and then aloud, "How about Caiden or Corvus? They scored higher than I did..."

She bites on the inside of her cheek. "Carrion asked Corvus directly and got told to screw off. I can't trust Caiden. So-"

" _Yet you can trust me?"_ he overrides that thought in his head. "So, that leaves me," Colt finishes her sentence. "Your last choice for selection."

Valencia's face clouds a bit. "Please, it wasn't like that..."

Colt shrugs his shoulders. "I don't care if I was your fifth choice or your first choice, Valencia, but I think I am going to have to disagree and refuse your offer," he gestures across the hall to Gaia's closed door, his district partner sleeping, wanting to sob forever about her own poor training score. "Besides, I have Gaia to take care of."

The Career follows his gaze, looking back, and then her gaze goes to the floor, she clucking her tongue. "Colt, you look like a sensible guy. I know you want to protect your district partner and all, but if it came down between you and her to save and get out of the arena alive, you're going to pick-"

"Gaia," he interrupts. He knows exactly what Valencia is going to do, what she is going to say; it is written all over her telling face. No matter how many secrets this girl thinks she can hide, there's a lot he can see. It is what he does. Sees through people. Sees through the mendacity, sees through the crap and the shit, and what he finds after all of that isn't exactly wonderful. "I'd save Gaia."

Valencia purses her lips. "I was going to say you'd obviously pick yourself..."

"I'm not that selfish."

"You don't value your life?" she furrows her eyebrows together in confusion.

"I didn't say that, Val," he uses the short end of her name to see what would happen, and he is pleasantly surprised - there isn't really a malicious bone in Colt's body, truth be told - that she is not perturbed by the nickname, her nostrils do not flare, and all that is there is a deep sorrow in her eyes instead of a burning anger. "Besides, if I joined the Careers and started to trust you, I'd have to save myself over you if I wanted to go home in the end, right?"

She gives a slight smirk. "I'd like to see you try, Colt."

He presses one hand on the back side of the door. He's made up his mind, quite handedly actually. "Thanks for the offer, Valencia, but I can't join you guys."

It is almost endearing at how disappointed Valencia looks when his words pass over her ears, like a child realizing that there are some things in this world that aren't always so sweet. She sucks on her bottom lip. "That's a shame..." and she sounds genuinely upset. "I wish you and Gaia the best, then, Colt. I hope we see each other in the arena it'll be as companions and not enemies..." She turns to walk away, Colt not finished yet.

"Valencia?" she turns around, a slight speckle of hope flickering across her face. "Linden's going to say no too," Colt says. "He and Peri are close, you can tell. He wouldn't abandon her for the world. Some of us actually have hearts and souls."

He's sure he doesn't need to add that line, as Valencia gives him a look that sends shocks of paralysis down his spine, but she leaves the floor and that is where a brilliant thought comes into his head.

Villianna finishes measuring out his shoulders, making sure the cashmere jacket fits him perfectly, and Colt opens his eyes, hit by a moment of inspiration.

He does need an alliance, he's heard every single person say that. If everyone is so afraid of him, as that is the opinion he garners from the rest... what if? He goes every tribute in his head that he can think of. Some tributes are going to flat out say no, some already in alliances like the Careers or District 7, and then there are the anomalies, the tributes he is unsure about.

There's a shortlist he compiles down to, and he's basing it off of tribute score.

" _Marissa, Gaia, Marina, Rochelle, Alexandra..._ " he thinks to himself. " _An alliance of six tributes, me and the rest, the ones I can end up protecting. To make sure they can get to the final five together, so I can get Gaia home..."_

Colt is smiling when Villianna finishes the fitting, he's sure she must be dotting off in her own head again that he is only grinning due to the outfit, but he's grinning with a whole other thought process.

He's got an alliance strategy now.

* * *

 ** _Milor Drusus: District 2 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

Milor wishes he could say with confidence that he has the same speaking talent as he does with a javelin or a spear. He'll admit it, as he is sure it is going to show on stage with Pollux that he has stage fright. Not only does he have to do it front of all of his competition, which is not an exactly heart-warming realization, but he has to do it anyways if he wants to live. Milor is confident in the fact that if he doesn't die within the ten minutes of hectic fighting at the Cornucopia, which can always happen if he isn't careful, there'll be sponsors. He knows he's attractive, and there shouldn't be anything in realizing that, but he knows there's the personal fear holding him back. There's his humility, his humanity... his _heart,_ and Milor doesn't know if he's quite prepared for tomorrow. It is usually all the Careers that get the kills, and will he be one of them?

He doesn't want to dwell on that any longer, instead walking up to the group of collected Careers - Persephone, Valencia, Carrion, and Maisey - and it stings him that there will be one missing. He doesn't like Marcus, as Valencia confides in him the asshole tendencies, but he only needs to like Marcus enough to not think twice about sending a spear in between his shoulder blades. However, he is pretty sure in the history of the Hunger Games there has never been a tribute splitting from the Careers before the Games even start... they always stick together, almost like family if he is to be so bold, and eventually when time wanders down, around the final ten if they're all still alive, they'll crack like an egg, sizzling on hot asphalt.

What strikes him is how _good_ everyone looks. "Persephone, you look beautiful..." he exhales. His district partner is quite stunning tonight - she's always been, actually, but it's great to tease her. It is almost relieving to have a best friend in the arena, even if he has to watch her die at some point - and he's always wondered where this side of her has been. Her hair is woven into the shape of a lotus flower in the back, wonderful dark strands resting against her shoulders. She's in a long flowing, almost pearlish white dress, delicate poinsettia flowers around her hair like a crown, and her radiant, nearly lustful skin tone pops against the back. "I-"

"Thank you, Milor," she giggles, giving him a cheeky smile. "You look nice too. I'm supposed to be like the namesake princess, Persephone," it takes his district partner every urge in her body not to roll her eyes. "The goddess of the underworld, the wife of Hades," she locks arms with him. "You want to be Hades?"

"Sure!" Milor exclaims a bit too happily for his taste, then stomping his foot in annoyance for the enthusiasm. He is nearly dressed in all black, coal colored pants and a jacket to match, a silver and gorgeous wristwatch on his left arm. He looks at the others. Valencia is in a startling velvet colored dress that is cut out at one of the legs, minimal makeup applied to her face, a lethal piece of heaven. Maisey is doused in gold, from her heavy golden blouse, to the light flecks of glitter at her eyes. Nothing can prepare Milor for Carrion however, and when his eyes pass over him, he even feels weak in the knees.

Carrion isn't even wearing a coat and jacket or any of that. He is dressed in a suave and deep amaranthine shirt, which is _see-through,_ down to his matching gray pants where there seems to be something clearly outlined by the waist... and Milor's mouth waters. He has stood by the sword fighting area, watching the way Carrion moves, how his muscles ripple through the training outfit, and he's seen the way the male from District 4 looks at him. Milor has seen Marcus throw a glance at him every once in awhile, but there's a telling in that with how Marcus's asshole qualities seem to just appear. With Carrion, there's no lust. Just... _want._ A desire that transcends the normal form of wanting.

He sees that Carrion is staring directly at him, and Milor's heart skips a beat. He can't help it. He's spoken to him a lot, actually, over the last three days. Carrion has his anger issues, his drinking problems, sure, but he seems sober tonight, his skin bright and toned, no puffiness of the cheeks or red eyes... and he looks _damn_ good. It hits him, a few seconds actually, that Persephone is no longer holding onto him, she's let go of his arm. She and the other two girls are talking together and giggling, and yet he is still standing there, Carrion looking at him, and he looking at Carrion, and neither man moving.

Milor's face flushes scarlet, and he looks away, trying not to notice the ever growing bulge in the District 4 male's pants. He's pretty sure there's blood flowing all around him too.

Carrion steps up to Milor, patting him on the back. "You look great tonight."

"And... and so do you,"

The guy flashes him a smile. "You gonna tell them tonight?"

Milor frowns in confusion. "Tell who what tonight?" He hasn't gone over any sort of script in his head; he doesn't have one, and he's pretty sure that he won't have one. He'll just go on stage, trip over himself, and look like an idiot. It'd be that or him frothing at the mouth at Pollux's beauty... but that is unattainable, what he has in Carrion is right in front of him.

"Y'know," Carrion drawls out. "Your sexuality. Will Panem get to know?"

His body nearly shuts down, and Milor recoils away from Carrion quite violently. There are the flashes of fists in his vision, of dark lights and blue lights and red going down his hands. His throat closes up, Milor trying to inhale, he squeezing his eyes shut and backing up against the wall. Milor cannot even imagine the ramifications that would happen if he admits he is gay on that stage, in front of everyone. He knows that the entire Career pack can tell, evident right there by what Carrion is saying, and how he cannot look at Persephone's chest without swallowing heavily... but does the entire tribute pack have to know? Does Panem need to know?

He shakes his head back and forth vigorously. "Not a chance. No one can know..." His dad would kill him. All that money spent in trying to 'fix' the Drusus golden boy, the heir of principality and righteousness... and his son being _gay..._ there'd be hellfire on stage and it'd consume him whole. "No can know..." he mutters, almost incessantly, almost babbling, almost _terrified._

Carrion's face drops in fright, he rushing up to Milor. The thrum of his heartbeat keeps Milor calm, and he realizes that the other guy has a good inch or two on him, enough to make a difference. "Hey, I'm sorry," he apologizes. "Don't say anything on that stage you don't want them to know, okay?" Carrion places a hand on the side of Milor's face. "Milor, _listen to me."_ The Career stops his heavy breathing, Milor's eyes wide, the anxiousness slowly disappearing. "I'm sorry. Don't do anything you're not comfortable with."

Milor nods his head solemnly, Carrion dropping the hand from his face, giving Milor's right arm a squeeze, with a pat on the back. The tributes, unlike with the training scores, have to be done in district order, female first, then male, and that means Milor is fourth tonight in terms of the interviews. He swallows again, trying to continue keeping the feeling of Carrion's hand on his face, an inexplicable warmth, a decadence that he is going to sorely miss.

He licks his lips, shunting his fear, turning off his objections.

Tonight is Interview Night, and Milor Drusus has a job to do.

He has to make everyone else fall in love with him.

Piece of cake.

* * *

 ** _Rochelle Pascal: District 3 Female P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

There's something nearly awe inspiring, to her, about standing next to a Capitol celebrity. The way the lights hit her on stage as she twirls around in her girlish sky blue dress, frocks and lace streaming as she spins up to Pollux. He is dressed damn handsomely, she must say, and there's been a lot of anticipation to this moment. As she looks out at the crowd, it is strange how there are faces she cannot see, that despite there being bright lights everywhere, some people are obscured into shadow the farther back the rows go. Rochelle places a hand over her eyes to try and see some, but her efforts prove to be towards no avail, as there's hardly anything remotely useful from the bit of light she sees.

Everyone is dressed far more fabulous than she is, however, Rochelle notes, with the way their dresses hug the right curves, or how their humps are too magnanimous. She looks down at herself, raising a hand to her flat chest, frowning alongside what clearly the rest of the audience shows. Pollux says something but it is drowned out by the waves of laughing she hears. Everyone's laughing and laughing and _laughing_ at her. Why won't the world leave her alone?

Pollux leans into her, the two sitting on a white couch, instead of seats this time, holding the microphone to her face. He actually has to tap her leg to get Rochelle to turn, her face a warp between calm and collected and fraught with terror. Even as he speaks again, placing a hand on her shoulder, his words mix in with the laughter. Everyone's gotta still be laughing at this point. "I'm sorry, Rochelle, did I scare you?"

"No... no, not at all," she says breathlessly, going back to look at the audience. It is nauseating for her, to stand in line and listen to four Career interviews, one after the other. Valencia is striking and stunning in that cardinal, showing the leg sort of trick and her confidence is palpable. Marcus reveals that he's going to go solo, which emanates an interesting sort of... _groan_ from the crowd, but it seems to amp the District 1 Male up even more. Persephone comments on camaraderie and that the political climate of the Careers have shifted. Milor drops the bombshell about his sexuality, to which the crowd cheers and stands on their feet, Milor looking like he's been dropped into the wrong place and time, he walking off with his hands in his face, and he scampers away from the crowd. Where... Rochelle hasn't gotten a clue.

How is she supposed to be able to beat the guy who has now laid himself on the line for everyone to see? What else could triumph that? How could anyone like her contest with a guy like _that?_

"You look great," Pollux says, and she knows he's just saying a rehearsed line. Everything about this event is rehearsed, from how long she's on stage, to the clothes that she is to wear, to the shoes that adorns her feet, and to the emotions she should be displaying. Screw that. Rochelle isn't about to let the Capitol make her their puppet. If she wants them to laugh at her, she'll try... _try_ her hardest to endure the humiliation. After all, nothing is better than someone giving their best attempt.

"Thank you," she smiles, hugging the dress to her body. Her legs are too big, she knows, her arms too frail, her heart too large, her eyes too wide... and here she is on this stage to be rammed up and humiliated. She has lasted exactly four seconds, the humiliation is too great, the pain in her heart too painful, and the smile falters.

He - Pollux, that is - has his head turned, and he repeats something out to the audience, perhaps on how Rochelle looks, and there's an uproar, chorusing the Master of Ceremonies response. Rochelle notices something about his neck. There's a strange red line from below his earlobe, down to where, perhaps it even goes farther than that, the shirt hides the rest of his neck, and subsequently his body. She furrows her eyebrows, scooting closer to him. Is that a scratch? She is unable to see it all too well.

The Interviewer turns around, nearly smacking her in the head, causing Rochelle to jump. Both of them take a second to recoup from the fright, she not expecting him to turn so suddenly, and he of course not expecting Rochelle to practically be breathing down his neck.

She catches a whiff of his scent, some sort of cologne, and it is downright gorgeous. Pollux straightens his suit out, which had become discombobulated from the sudden scare. "I guess you really just wanted to get close and personal to all of this, right?"

The natural response is that there's usually to be some sort of flattery about him, right? The Master of Ceremonies loves their ego to be stroked - _That's not the only thing they like stroked,_ Deacon mutters into his bowl of soup for lunch yesterday, in which she punches him in the arm - and Rochelle is certain to not give him that satisfaction. There's so many people in the world, in Panem, who can give Pollux their flowers, and their hearts, and their STD's, but not today, it isn't happening.

"No," she says, and his face changes in an instant, an immediate turning of the head and a frown. "I was looking at the cut on the back of your neck."

Pollux swishes his tongue in his mouth, nodding lowly. She wants to read his mind, but a hush seems to have fallen over the audience. Perhaps... perhaps she's managed to top Milor's heartbreaking performance. "Here's one for you Rochelle, since you seem to be so honest. Deacon," _What about Deacon,_ her mind thinks? "Your district partner, right? He's about to come on stage in a minute. Deacon seems like a nice lad, young and hopeful, handsome," Pollux recites, and then his eyebrows raise. "With the Quarter Quell twist, you guys have to vote for one another on who you're going to kill, so that means there's got to be some tributes you want dead above others, correct?" the Master of Ceremonies crosses his legs. "Tell me, Rochelle, would you vote for Deacon?"

"Absolutely not," Rochelle responds. There's nothing worse than betrayal of your district partner, that always haunts the victors to the day they die, she's told. However...

"Expected that response," he shifts closer on the couch to her. "Now, I have to ask, what is your _opinion_ on Deacon? Even if you don't want to kill him, clearly you can like or dislike him right? What's one word you can think of for him? You can be honest."

Rochelle looks back at the audience, and there's hushed whisperers everywhere. She wants to stand up and scream, to tell everyone to stop looking at her. Yet, there's not a single noise going on in the crowd, Rochelle is standing up and looking at everyone's glamorous bodies and hairdos, Pollux leaning in so he can get a response. She hasn't spoken. He says be honest, right? She's been told since she's a young girl, her dad's hand on her shoulder, to be honest, and he's given her the freedom.

She likes Deacon, she likes hanging out with him, but he's a complete and total-

"Disappointment," Rochelle says, her shoulders settling down. She looks back at Pollux. "The one word you'd use to describe him. Disappointment."

* * *

 ** _Maisey Rovneay: District 4 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

Everything she has done has been for this. All the hours: the sweat, the blood, the tears, the welts on her hands, it has been for this moment. _Well,_ one of these moments instead, as she's here, in the Capitol, having an interview in front of the entire country, and with the most handsome guy on the planet. She'll leave the tributes to squabble amongst themselves over relationships between each other; Maisey's eye is on the big one, the prize that tops all of them.

 _Fame and glory._

Deacon comes on stage, sputtering over his words and red in the face, because let's face it - Maisey feels the pain that he must be going through, to be thrown under the bus like that - and it seems like he is unable to recover, calling Rochelle a rude and venomous snake. Emotions get the best of everyone, right? Not Maisey. She takes a running leap to the stage, probably ripping her dress into several parts, but doesn't matter. She's on cloud nine right now. Her adventure is starting today, and there's no one who is going to get in her way.

The Gamemakers clearly didn't appreciate the fact she has more talent than simply wielding a weapon and swinging it at whatever moves. Her strength is strong, something she realizes she should have showed in the arena, for how far she could've flung a practice dummy or something, but it looks like everyone is starting to call her the weakest Career, even with Marcus in the group who is a far worse shot than what he is ever going to admit. There's more to her, and Maisey is so pumped about the bloodbath that it really is hard for her to keep it all pent up inside.

She isn't crazy.

That's what Persephone calls her behind her back, Maisey hears the way her fellow Career sneers at her. She isn't crazy. Dedication and motivation is not insanity. She doesn't want to remove someone's guts and jump rope with them... insanity isn't a part of her. However, what she does, by leaping to the stage, that might be a bit unorthodox. Unorthodoxy, that Maisey can handle well.

The crowd cheers as she gets to her feet, a golden tornado, a decadent twister of halcyon and sunshine, and a dose of lethality to boot.

Maisey sits down on the couch, and she's pretty sure, as Pollux has done with everyone, he is going to reach for her hand and kiss it. Instead, when he moves, she reaches down and picks up his hand, fingers so soft in hers, almost as if she is touching a cherub's skin, leaning down and kissing it. There's a slight residue mark of her lipstick on his skin, which she is sure must be driving him bonkers, but her doing that gets another cheer to rise from everyone watching, and Pollux grins back at her.

"It's an honor," she says, scooting closer. She isn't going to sit in his lap, but she'll try as damn close as she can probably. This is a type of world she can get used to, holding wine glasses in manicured hands, taking hors d'oeuvres back to her room to stash under her bed, and occasionally mentoring a victor from the Career pack. There always needs to be a change of guard in the system every once in awhile, right? She'll gladly let it start with her, if the arena will allow it.

Pollux narrows his eyes at her, she about six or so inches away from him, and it is a gaze that cuts through bone and marble alike. Maisey gets the message clear enough. _That's far enough. This is my show, not you. You're just the appetizer._

All of a sudden, Maisey is extremely hungry.

"That was quite an entrance!" he applauds, turning back to the audience. "Let's give her another round of applause, right folks?"

Maisey giggles to herself. Valencia and Persephone, and now from what Milor reports, Victoria from District 10... they can eat their hearts out. This is what it means to have the audience in the palm of your hand. "Well, I like to exceed expectations," she smirks, an alluring glow in her eyes. Everyone is just going to be eating her up, aren't they? Let anyone else try to replicate her girlish charm, eight other ladies to follow her routine, and she's sure her charisma is wafting out to the corners of the theater.

"Expectations exceeded!" Pollux exclaims, putting a hand on her knee. He grips too hard for her, she slightly jerking away, again, message clear enough. _You try and pull some shit like that again, I'll make you cry._ She's pretty sure she's romping all over the Interviewer's stomping grounds, where he's mastered this domain for quite some time, but eventually, _eventually,_ maybe even Pollux Aetos can fall out of approval ratings. If she wins this thing, Maisey very much likes the idea of taking over the theater, taking over the stage and speaking for everyone.

She certainly takes up enough room.

"I will tell you all, I am extremely excited," Maisey admits. It must be written all over her face, the genuine surprise, the happiness, the desire and want to be here, and nothing is going to rip it away from her. Nothing at all. If she dies, that is somewhat souring, but Maisey knows she isn't going to die. She's going to win the Games.

"And why is that?"

"I've been wanting to do this ever since I was a little girl," she scoots just an inch forward, Pollux's eyes flashing a warning, but since she's already managed to get as far as she has pushing at the boundaries, what's an extra inch going to hurt. It isn't like he can just push her to the side, especially now that Maisey is in a story. "Back home, there's always been these chances for me to get here, but I've been cheated every single time by constantly changing standards. I said, you know what, I am sick and tired of this and I volunteered. Someone else tried instead to become the District 4 female tribute for the Quell, but as I am sure you all saw, changed that," she laughs.

Pollux nods his head. "We sure did? You ended up pushing her to the ground, right? I think the girl you pushed, from how hard she hit the ground, and how she fell... I think she broke her arm. Does that bother you?"

Maisey shrugs. "Why should it? I said, this was my dream and she tried getting in the way of my dream to become a tribute. So she broke her arm. She's lucky nothing else broke," and the girl from District 4, a dressed up piece of sunshine, a sun flare, radiant and destructive in its power, turns to face the collected group of tributes on the side of the stage, Carrion grinning at his district partner from ear to ear. "I've also desired being a Hunger Games victor since I was a little girl. Knowing what I did to someone who simply wanted to volunteer, what do you think I am going to do to any of you who get in the way of me being a victor?"

She doesn't let Pollux dismiss her, or a buzzer, or anything like that. Maisey stands up from her seat, dusts herself off, ruffles her dress some, and in her heels, and looking like liquid gold being poured onto the stage, dismisses herself.

Her words do not just come off as a warning, a sign of the times.

They're the truth.

* * *

 ** _Linden Hazel: District 7 Male P.O.V (14)_**

* * *

Carrion tells the story of his reaping, and how he's stone cold drunk and volunteers, but he doesn't regret it. Annabellina dances out on stage in _pointe_ shoes, dressed all girly, calling herself Belle, and the conversation they have is almost endearing. Edwin points out that he and Annabellina have been getting along great, but there's a certain scorn behind his eyes that is very telling. Lowelle gives her opinions on every tribute, which is quite hilarious to listen to, as they range from downright hatred to ally, which aligns itself perfectly with Corvus who follows up. He tells the audience, in a tearful, soulful, _honest_ story about how his house burned down, to how he gets his muscle. He calls Pollux hot on stage, and even manages to pat the guy's shoulder, which certainly means the male from District 6 is in heaven.

Linden watches Peri give her interview, dressed finely in a two piece skirt and top, woven with leaves and violets, she wearing a wig. It is a last minute decision, but she decides it is the best. She does admit her baldness, but when prompted further, a twinkle replaces the general look in her eyes, a telling glow. _It's a secret,_ she says. He finds her to be absolutely breathtaking, but there's a certain thought in his mind, in Linden's head, that he cannot get away from.

He is going to have to get out of the arena over her dead body, a thought he hasn't truthfully come to terms with yet. The time he has spent with her has been wonderful... absolutely lovely, and he might end up needing to stab her in the back.

The lights hit him, after Linden makes his way up the steps. This is the best he's felt and looked in ages, moreso than when he is all dressed up for the tribute parade, as that is all done in special effects and costumes. These are outfits meant to make the tributes look their best, and that is a completely different story. He shakes Pollux's hand gallantly, smiling. He is dressed to be a campfire. His shimmering auburn hair is the brightest part of him, slowly going down until the seams of his pants are a charcoal black, burnt logs after the oxygen has completely died down.

There is something so alluring about a flame, and that is what Linden feels like he is... a flame that will continue to grow and grow, consuming the oxygen around him.

"It's great to have you here, Linden!" Pollux grins, the two sitting down on the couch. Linden immediately crosses his legs. It is his mentor after all who tells him, in the end of it all, to be a gentleman; politeness in the arena actually goes a long way for certain sponsors, the sponsors who have the big bucks, the great sums of money that'll actually mean a difference.

"It's great to be here!" he smiles back. Cuteness is his skill. It helps that he's usually happy, as it is, and usually positively. From that response, as Linden gives the audience a quick one-over, he's sure all their hearts just melted, just _melted._ "Thanks for having me."

"So, I have to ask you, kiddo- is it okay if I call you kiddo?"

"Call me whatever you like!" In his head, he realizes that response isn't probably as strong as it should've been. It almost makes it quite icky all of a sudden, a strange grossness coating Linden's arms. He scratches them absentmindedly.

"So, an _8._ You're the youngest tribute to score that high, and Hero and Victoria have scored higher than you, but you in this tiny frame of yours, getting that high of a score, Career level, actually, that's quite impressive," Pollux turns in to the kid. "Between you and me, just you and me, what did you do to get such a high score?"

Linden makes an exasperating sigh, exaggerating his movement as he falls back up against the couch. "Darn! I thought I was just going to share it with the audience. Between you and me, you're asking too much," the crowd laughs with him, and his grin widens, showing those teeth, making everyone's hearts open even wider. "But, I must've impressed the right people I suppose. Must've done something right."

"Not even a hint?"

"Fine," Linden rolls his eyes. The crowd cheers and applauds, and there's a slight stabbing sense in his stomach. This is sickening, hearing them gaff at everything he does. "I wrestled with a trainer who was at least a foot taller than me," he makes another grin. He needs a smile counter. "And _won."_

Pollux rears back some from the explanation, face in awe. "You beat a guy a foot taller than you? In hand-to-hand combat? How'd you do that?"

"Easy," he shrugs. "I've been living on the street for a long time now, and the rules don't apply anymore now that you no longer have parents or a roof under your head."

The Interviewer sits up, rubbing his chin. "Why didn't you go into foster care services?"

"I ran away," Linden explains. "And should I win the Hunger Games, what are they going to do? Send me into the system as a victor?" He shakes his head. "I get to decide my own future, no one else."

There's an event he doesn't say, and Linden isn't going to share it in front of all of these people who somehow feel as if they have the right to know every deep secret. One night, and it is raining. He is huddled underneath the Peacekeeper headquarters, hiding in the shadows in case they decide to chase him off of the property like the gutter rat he has always felt like. There's some lightning and thunder, electrons making shows across the dark sky. Out in the distance, illuminated in the luster glow of the lightning bolts is this woman.

At least, that's what Linden thinks the person out there is. The person locks eyes with him, from across the street, he huddled together under a blanket, and approaches him. It's a woman, definitely, when he sees her up close, she dressed in something that is totally not fit for the weather... Linden can still feel her cold hands. While the streets have turned him into a fox, they've also destroyed his mind a bit, and perhaps it is Peri that brings back the light.

"Very well said, Linden," Pollux says. As if the guy knows anything about philosophical sayings or struggles. He leans forward, Linden sitting straight. There seems to be a tone shift in the audience, a hush falling over the crowd. "I have one last question for you, Linden. As you know, I've been asking some of you guys' opinions on your district partners. You seem like a nice young man, and I need to know... what do you think of Peri?"

Linden's palms all of a sudden get very sweaty. "Umm..." whatever sparkle he has vanishes in a few seconds. He's known Peri for only four days yet there's a strange magnetism to her. He knows that to get home, he'll have to get over her, an ending he doesn't want to think about right now. Linden is unable to lie, however, and say that he doesn't like spending time with Peri. She's beautiful, despite her flaws, and she's more than human because of her flaws. She is weak most hours of the day, he supporting her, but when it'll come time to tether ties, he'll close his eyes and swipe down, blade in hand, scarlet spewing everywhere.

"Do you have an answer?" Pollux leans in, and Linden wants to bash his perfect face in.

"She's brave."

"Brave?" the Master of Ceremonies places his chin on his elbow. "I haven't heard anyone say that about anyone so far. Why brave?"

"She volunteered," Linden answers.

"As we've learned. Some people would view volunteering as a non-Career to be suicidal, wouldn't you agree?"

"Not in her case."

"Why is Peri special?"

He knows that it would probably be bad to say it, as Peri does not mention it with her time on the stage, and she knows because it has always been the disdain with the whole pity thing. She loathes pity, and he's trying to not resurrect any of those feelings. She'd kill him. "She's dying," Linden says. "She has leukemia, and she doesn't have long to live. She volunteered so she could go out with a band. And you're going to kill her. Feel bad yet?"

The buzzer goes off, and he doesn't let Pollux dismiss him. He'll dismiss himself.

Peri is totally going to kill him, though.

* * *

 ** _Galiant Rushmohone: District 8 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

There's only one thought racing through his head as he is sitting next to Pollux on stage, and that is how whenever he looks at Marina, at her frail little body, at the way her eyes light up talking about numbers and District 8 and being back home, there's a nagging thought in the back of his head that is desperate to tell the truth, desperate to scream from the mountaintops and the rooftops that the future outlined before him, the future they see... it is a future without Marina in it, a future where they're gone and dead, where she's a corpse sitting on a throne made of skulls, torches lining the walls and an echo of her last, dying scream that plays on a record, a loop that never stops.

She looks quite adorable, cute even, if he is to go that far, in an amaranthine colored dress that shows off the darker skin tones of her body, her hair styled delicately in a wrap, and she looks quite nice, only for her illusion to be shattered when it is revealed she has scored the lowest out of every tribute. The Master of Ceremonies is unable to resist one last jab at her however, grinning villainously while doing it, and poor Marina turns a putrid scarlet in the face, nearly running off stage in tears, gilded crystal droplets following her wake. Never in her life has she been so humiliated.

Now, it is Galiant's turn, and all he can think about is how his district partner is going to die. How she's going to probably be stabbed through the heart by a tribute she least expects. He knows it won't be him to be who ends Marina Penweather's life. It isn't written in his DNA, and he's sure it isn't a skill he's all of a sudden learned and picked up while training to be an expert killer. Chauvinistic asshole, that he understands. Brutal murderer? Galiant looks at his hands and cannot imagine themselves being coated in scarlet... it cannot be something that will come to pass.

It isn't to say he will never kill, he knows that in his heart there's a survival instinct that will kick in, it will overwhelm his senses and take him elsewhere beyond the horizon, perhaps at a Career. Perhaps he'll be the vote that keels over taking out of the Career threats... _perhaps._

He is jarred back to the present moment when Pollux slaps a hand on his shoulder, startling him. The night has been going quite rocky for the Head Interviewer, and Galiant would love to get inside his head and learns what would make him tick, what thoughts are racing through Pollux Aetos's mind. Galiant is pretty sure he's not about to make anything easier. If Pollux is dressed like a shard of the moon, the male from District 8 looks down at his outfit and it is as if he is plucked straight out of the waters from District 4 instead. He is a light blue, nearly sea-green suit and jacket, with bright colored bits of coral interspersed throughout, and it is magnificent, purely _magnificent._ He is feeling like a million bucks right now, but he isn't quite so sure why he'd be wearing an outfit that'd more suit Carrion than he himself, but he doesn't have the time to think about that right now.

"So, Galiant, I have to say I think your outfit looks like it is trying to resemble me some, am I right audience?" he cackles out to the crowd of his lovers, of his supporters, and all Galiant wants to do is kick him in the rear end out into his so called _beloved_ crew. It makes him sick with disgust.

"I dunno, I think our wardrobes might've gotten switched up."

That gets a resounding laugh from the onlookers, but it certainly does not fill his heart all too well. Marina's words over the last few days keep replaying themselves over and over in his mind. He thinks, at first, she must be obsessed with him, as no one has ever been this nice to him before or has really tried to get to connect to him, and yet here he is down the line constantly refusing her help, constantly refusing to acknowledge what is happening, and now he's come to an impasse. He has to see his future on the horizon to realize it _doesn't_ get better from here. There's nowhere else for him to go, no other path to take.

"I have to ask, Galiant, is your name a mix-up with the word, gallant?" Pollux leans in. "I think we are all dying to know."

" _All are going to die, rather,"_ his mind retorts sharply, to himself, and Galiant lets his mind go with it. What else could he manage to lose? "I dunno. I think my mom was drunk when she had me and just picked some random ass name."

There's a quiet hush over the crowd, but that is only because, in such a professional setting - _professional, my ass,_ as his mother would say, holding the shoe and bringing it down, down, _down,_ against his skull - there really should be no cursing on stage. Galiant has watched the clip of Johanna Mason cursing on stage over and over again, laughing so much his belly aches... and maybe he wishes to replicate her magic. "It sounds like you and your mother might not have the best of relationships, then."

 _"You're a great detective,"_ Galiant says to himself sarcastically, and then he moves himself a bit on the couch. "Yeah, you'd be right. As a matter of fact, she's an abusive mom. She's a drunkard who beats me," another hush falls across the room, and that is when everyone's heart drops. Galiant is so confused by these reactions. These people have no problem, absolutely _no_ problem when it comes to these tributes, these twelve to eighteen year-old's dying, but the moment someone reveals their pregnant or reveals that they've been abused, or that they're sexually repressed, not to bash Milor or anyone in that sphere, the crowd all of a sudden lashes out in _uproar?_ As if these people were ever humane... Galiant knows that him admitting the truth, he saying it in front of the entire nation, it will garner him some points. Perhaps not enough, but points all the same. "Actually, that's the reason why I'm here. Like Peri, I came to run away from something. I applied, this year, for tesserae sixty-two times. That put my name in the reaping jar at a hundred and ninety-seven. There'd be an absolute zero chance of me actually not getting picked," he leans forward towards Pollux, the Interviewer clamoring back away up on the couch. "And do you want to know why I'd go down there to apply for tesserae day in and day out? Wouldn't you all like to know?" at this point Galiant is practically sneering. "The process would take upwards to three hours. That was three hours of my day I wasn't home so my drunk _bitch_ of a mother wouldn't beat me all the time! I took so much tesserae for myself, just for _me,_ that I got told I couldn't take anymore. That I was on a suicide mission! They said, 'it's okay son, go back to your slut drunken whore of a mother who'll crack your skull open with a frying pan', and so I did. And so I did..."

It all comes out, in an instant, in a flash, and Galiant is left feeling empty. A hollowness in his skull that resonates... a pain, a suffering, a desire for me and a desire to not be considered so less from everyone. It is in this moment and time, he has turned his feelings into words, and these words into actions. Perhaps he doesn't want to make it home back to his loving mother and live in riches forever, with her by his side even if she does die of liver failure one day.

Marina's absolutely right. He's an asshole because the one person who is supposed to care about him has taken his heart and shriveled it up into a ball, throwing it away and throwing it down for the pigs to feast on. He's an asshole because Marina is trying to get to close, and if she is going to die in the arena tomorrow, why is he going to get close himself?

Galiant Rushmohone isn't feeling all to gallant at this moment and time.

The silence that follows this speech, this truth that he has laid out for everyone... it is only the sound of the buzzer that breaks the spell.

* * *

 ** _Marissa Herdier: District 9 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

It's been quite a surprise, these last couple of days, for Marissa. She's expecting all these wonderful things to sort of happen without moving a finger, which she knows is out of pure laziness and stupidity and far other worse things, but then she also looks back and realizes that there's been a marginalized push of effort on her behalf, where she hasn't performed to excellent, _excellent_ standards like she is used to. Marissa Herdier is used to getting her way, but not because she's always been the one to hang on the edge of glory and cheat... there's a method to her madness. Inexplicable, but it is there.

She tries comparing herself with Blake. When she sees him, her district partner, she sees a guy who is mad at the world, pissed off because all of the inequality that happens around him, yet he does nothing to try and quell his rage; Blake has it fester deep down in his body, deep down his soul, and he's aching all over but for some reason he won't let anyone get close. She finds him almost similar to Galiant, she now just appearing on stage after the haste departure of the District 8 male, but the difference is that Blake could snap someone's neck in two. There's almost nothing separating her from him right now, in terms of success, as they're both from the same district, they've both scored five's for the Gamemakers, which is interesting enough, as usually District 9 strongly underperforms in that regard. Marissa has one thing higher than him, of course, despite his size... she's got the appeal.

Her mind can often become a battleground, she's discovered, when she's romancing the escort with his dumb bright blue hair. He's in their apartment everyday, as he's supposed to be, because he's part of the team. However, when Marissa locks eyes with him, the moment is fleeting, it is only temporary, it doesn't exist, because he is too caught up in the fact he has betrayed her, he's thrown her to the wolves and she is to be devoured. At least, that is probably what everyone in the Capitol has been telling her, every tribute believes this to be true. She isn't so sure she's ready to bow out just yet. Her escort stabs her in the back and now doesn't have the decency to admit it to her, to have the decency to apologize... instead Marissa has to suffer the consequences.

Perhaps it is the karma of her being labeled District 9's whore with two legs and a mouth. It is what some people at school call her, until she breaks their nose in a fistfight. Marissa learns how to scrap when she's younger thanks to amazing parents, but she isn't quite so certain scrapping with Marcus Pharadane or wrestling Maisey Rovneay is going to get her any closer to the crown jewel of victor, especially in a Quarter Quell. She's also certain now, at this point, with the quartering so close to being finished, that she's going to be alone. There won't be an alliance to pick up. Blake's chances at the Careers are shot down by the training score, she's seen District 7 unite from the first get-go, and whatever other alliances might be there... she hasn't caught wind of.

Blake hasn't approached her to become allies. Granted, she mulls by biting on the inside of her cheek, he hasn't approached her at all. It must be destined, the two District 9 tributes will be on their own for the remainder of the Games, for the entire continuity of the Games.

Pollux whistles when she approaches the stage, her stylist immediately taking note of how her cleavage, when she moves at just the write spot, is the perfect spot for moonlight or any kind of light, really, to pool, to draw eyes to her. A few of the jeers she hears out in the audience kind of creep her out, as there's always an old man or two who wants to take a spot of revitalization before their heart croaks out, but it isn't in her to stoop so low. Pollux admiring her beauty is something she's okay with, only because it is clear that the Master of Ceremonies is flaming every which way from Sunday.

She is dressed in a beautiful debutante gown, lustrous and almost ghoulish white, low cut near the chest, and on her head is a woven flower tiara; not a crown like Persephone's. It is a clash of style, nature and fabric, and with her even more illuminating olive skin tone, Marissa feels like she's on the moon.

"Don't you simply look marvelous!" Pollux crows, smiling, and it may be the most genuine smile he has given all evening, looking back in context, she's pretty certain from the way the teeth form the bridging action... there's no clenching, it is all there.

"Thank you," Marissa takes her seat, holding the rest of her long gown with her - it is quite extensive, and she is surprised no one behind her has stepped on it yet, which sounds like something a majority of the tributes behind her would do - and she rights the tiara on her head. "My stylist had a burst of inspiration."

"Something is certainly bursting," the Interviewer gaffs, at which the audience howls in response.

Marissa's eyes narrow to snake-like slits. " _You have your little laugh now, but it looks like everyone on this stage has been making you look like the fool, Mr. Aetos._ "

"Marissa, I have to ask you, are you prepared?" asks Pollux about a minute later, there being an enormous block of time, to at least it feels like eons for Marissa, dedicated about the composition of her gown. The entire audience seems to be leaning in on this precipice, a narrow ledge that has positivity on one side, and negativity on the other. She knows that is because everyone has already made up their mind. Everyone has made up their mind a long time ago, actually. She's beautiful, she's exposing her skin, there mustn't be any other qualities to her.

She bites on her lip, an uncharacteristic action for a lady. "As well as I can be," she admits. "I don't think all of my weaponry skills are there. Perhaps with a bit more of time, I wouldn't feel as unprepared as I do now."

"Would you say that is what is leading towards your training score? Seems like you may have been able to get a higher one."

Marissa is not sure if he is complimenting her, backhanding her across the face, or doing both at the same time. It occurs to her, while she's lying on her bed just a few hours ago, that she and Blake only chose archery as their selected skill to show the Gamemakers is because it is all they had practiced after Maisey's instructions, after her little tutoring lesson, and it is unfortunate that Marissa's extensive knowledge on archery falls flat. "It could be a part of it," she agrees. "However, I think it also just means I needed to make better choices."

Pollux makes a crowing noise, this one sounding definitely to be taunting, like getting stabbed in the ribs with a pencil, or a blade, whichever she prefers. Marissa narrows her eyes at him again, but it he sees her do this, he does not react to it. Perhaps Pollux Aetos is getting ticked off at being the laughingstock of the Capitol. "Aww, I am sure that is not the case. I am sure you are going to do just fine in the Games."

 _"Fine?"_ her mind retorts. " _Fine is the same thing as good. Good means death. Good is not enough. I need to be amazing. I need to win!"_ and on stage, she purses her lips, shifting her gown some. "Perhaps. I think the voting polls are going to shape how well I do, for sure."

"I am glad that you brought that up!" Pollux ruffles his suit some, beads of sweat trickling down his forehead. This has been a long night, and it is only about to finally hit its stride. "I've been asking people on stage opinions about their district partners, and we've gotten some interesting responses. I would like to know not just your opinion on your district partner, but your opinion on the entire tribute section as a whole. I am pretty sure we have the time for it. Would you be as so kind to share your thoughts?" he directs the microphone at her face.

Marissa frowns. She hasn't given much thought, besides what she just said on stage, hoping it sounds revolutionary, to the voting. Who'd she vote for... who'd she expect to die, and that is something that chills her blood to ice. She hasn't truly disliked anyone. Some get on her nerves, but that sounds beyond too extensive and ridiculous to go as far to suggest having them killed... does she hate anyone enough to vote for them? Does she hate _herself_ enough to toss her hat in the ring? Marissa isn't sure.

Her answer?

She picks her gown up and walks off the stage instead, not answering him, not giving Pollux the satisfaction of having her get in trouble with the tributes. After all, when she narrows her eyes at him, it is so he can have his laugh, and she'll have hers. Oh how she took him down.

Marissa has never felt this much rebellion in her veins in her life.

She loves it.

* * *

 ** _Gaia Whisp: District 12 Female P.O.V (13)_**

* * *

She's used to being last. Or, in the Interviewing case, _second_ to last. Gaia Whisp sits on Pollux's couch, the Interviewer seemingly taking a sigh of relief when he gets to announce her arrival to the stage, as it is clear that a thirteen year-old little girl from District 12 is surely easy to handle. Blake nearly strangles Pollux on stage after he brings up some sort of familial past. Victoria reveals to Panem that they are now part of the Careers, and Hero admits that he is starting to feel a little bit unsure about the whole survivability thing, he unable to look at his district partner for a sustained period of time. Alexandra has a fieriness to her, in the eyes, and she immediately tells the audience that her district partner is not to be trusted... but when asked to divulge, her eyes narrow and nothing happens. Caiden, after apparently being exposed, lights the stage up with a discussion of chemicals; he aspires to be a chemist.

And now, here Gaia sits, where her feet are unable to touch the floor, and that elicits a few loud sighs of confection thrown her way. She's never had this many eyes staring at her; she almost feels too exposed in a certain light. With the tribute parade it is different. She's in the back, District 7 has taken all of the spotlight, and she's dressed all loved up in a pink dress covered in coal splatters, like a deranged Alice in Wonderland, and Colt is wearing some sort of avantgarde Steampunk-esque outfit, complete with a brimmed hat, and they're Alice and the Mad Hatter, taking District 12's coal concept for a spin.

She is wearing the same dress tonight, actually, a carnation pink that has a bow tied in the back, and a lovely little blue bow put in her hair, she transported straight out of the work from before. The stains are all washed out, her skin is scrubbed without mercy to remove all the blemishes from falling down again and again and again in the training center. Having this many eyes looking at her while sitting on stage, televised to all of Panem, it is a bit intimidating, and with twenty-two different interviews that have had a complete and total disarray of emotions... she's got a lot to live up to.

"How are you feeling tonight, Miss Whisp?" Pollux asks, his tone shifting somewhat because it is indeed a little girl sitting on stage. With Deacon and Marina, despite being the same age, there's a maturity in them that has been evoked, that has been drawn out due to their time in the gilded city. Gaia is still this innocent little girl with a tragic past that refuses to be exhumed.

"Pretty good," she smiles back at him. While the experience of being naked for her stylists is weird and unusual for her, being in this theater has become a joy to witness. The columns are grand and braggadocios, laminated in gold, and she wants it all. If she is to look this good, she wouldn't mind the hours spent getting ready. "I- I have really enjoyed my time here. It has been unlike anything I've ever experienced."

All she's known is loneliness. Solitude. Gray skies and Moorish winds. Cold temperatures in the night. Empty hearths being lit in the caverns of a fireplace. No one's hands to hold her at night while she cries. No brother to give her the extra boost she needs. No blade to fight off the demons she sees in the corner.

Now, she's come to the Capitol and she's with someone every waking second. Even an Avox who doesn't speak is giving her company, something they don't truly need to do, and it makes her feel lovely, absolutely lovely. She's no longer scared of Colt, managing to have him unwrap that hard, cold exterior and break a grin, to experience the joys of having an ally, a friend, a brother. The sheets she sleeps in are warm, pieces of silk decorating her entire body. There's always a roaring fireplace in the corner, and it pales in comparison to the one in her heart. If she cries, Colt is there. If she cannot reach something or achieve a goal, Colt is there to help her. He's her blade, her knight in shining armor to fight off the demons in the dark.

"I would tend to agree with you," Pollux nods, assuring her that her beliefs are not unfounded. "I live here and I wouldn't want to be anywhere else."

When her training score comes on, she expects it to be even lower. A four is actually not too bad for a girl from District 12 who has been by herself for a long time. There's more to her, and she's not letting anyone count her out.

Gaia stands up. Pollux's face flashes in fear for a split, afraid that she'll rock the apple cart, turn things over and mess everything up, but she's got an even better idea. She clenches her hands into fists by her side, she lifting her chin. She may be small. She may be underprivileged. She may not have a weapon by her side the way she wants to... but there's something else she has.

 _Motivation._

A desire to make it back here, to this gilded theater, to look at the golden columns and the high rise skyscrapers that are one sheen of glass, a shimmering silver that shines in the sunlight. Fountains to adorn her walk to the presidential mansion... a morsel of the life she has lived the last four days. How much she wants it... and how much she might be willing to do to achieve it.

She looks at Pollux with a brave new resolve.

"I loved this experience so much. I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world. I am willing to do whatever it takes to get back here."

Somewhere, maybe in her heart, a buzzer goes off.

* * *

 **There we are ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #20: Pollux's Showdown, our Interviewing chapter. I have always loved these, and man, welcome to another 10k+ chapter, like I figured. So, a good bit to go over. Firstly, it looks like Colt has a plan put in place for an alliance - will it sink or will it swim? - which may or may not work. Milor and Carrion have had a bonding moment, Rochelle reveals the truth about Deacon, Maisey is practically crazy at this point, Linden revealed Peri's secret, Galiant exploded, Marissa manages to have the last laugh, and Gaia has created for herself a new resolve.**

 **I made sure to include the topics of what the tribute points of view I didn't use, all sixteen in total, were mentioned... which out of those were your favorites and or least favorites? Which out of the eight perspectives did you like and didn't like? The other remaining twelve tributes who've yet to have a second point of view will be having theirs in the next two chapters, 21 and 22, as the Aftermath of the Interviews, which will feature six points of view per chapter with a lot of material to cover.**

 **Any last minute predictions for the start of the Games? Remember, bloodbath is Chapter 23: Prey Versus Prey, and everything is going to ramp up from here. Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope you do review, you guys as submitters have been awesome at keeping up with it! I will see you all shortly soon with Chapter #21: Visions of Glory. I hope you all have an amazing day! Love you guys so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	21. Visions of Glory (Night Before I)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #21: Visions of Glory. (Cannot believe we're in the 20's ya'll...). Last chapter was #20: Pollux's Showdown, the Interview chapter, and we saw from eight different POVs, and goodness we reached 12k word count for that story which is quite insane, and I know that opinions of tributes have gone all haywire, haven't they? This chapter, alongside the next, is the last normal time we see them... because Bloodbath is coming up ya'll. This chapter will show us six POVs, and 22 will as well. Something to keep in mind for pretty much all of these is that they're not shown in chronological order, except for ones that are linking and explanatory. Hope you guys enjoy Chapter #21: Visions of Glory.**

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

The night has been a disaster. Valencia has no other word to describe it. All she can think about is the way that Pollux manhandles her on stage. Well, she isn't actually manhandled, but she sure as hell feels like it. Pollux's smile is disarming, his voice easy and she falls apart. Here Valencia is, supposed to be the leader of the Career pack, five turned seven, and she's being ripped apart at the seams. The audience seems to enjoy her interview, she's certain, but she's also first in a round of twenty-three after her. It looks like there's an odds tie between Milor and Linden for current victor. She sees promise in her fellow Career, after all he's the second highest scorer, only one to receive a ten, which is often reserved only for them anyways, and he's charming. Valencia senses his sexuality from first glance, and also because Marcus mentions it to her as a way to get under the guy's skin.

Speaking of her district partner, the latter word being quite loose in this sense, he is sitting up against one of the stone columns next to the window, eyes looking out at the Capitol skyline. They need to get to bed soon, but they haven't yet, and she's for some reason still sitting in the living room next to the disease that is Marcus Pharadane. She is still trying to understand his angle. He wants fame, he wants fortune, and he knows that the only real way to achieve it is by becoming a victor of the Hunger Games. His archery skills, while they aren't terrible, aren't the best. He's the best one out of the group of tributes, Valencia never liking that she has to be far away to have a vantage point. She wants to up close and personal, to watch as she drives the sharp end of her sword into the other tribute's gut, but there's a certain madness behind her thinking that jars her to back to the present.

She doesn't want to see Marcus die alone from the pack. District 1 and 2 always, _always_ outlive the others, and it is usually them four in the Careers at the end to fight off the rest. He is still ticked off at only scoring a nine - Valencia cannot believe she just thought about _only -_ as he could've scored a lot worse. He's still, with Victoria, the third or fourth highest scoring tribute. That is quite the accolade.

Valencia likes Victoria and Hero. There's a certain brashness to them that she appreciates, a teamwork in their fighting ability that has clearly been rehearsed. While she knows Marcus well, being alongside him for several years, there's no physical fighting chemistry or symmetry in their movements. From further prompting on Milor's end when he asked them to join, it is evident that they're the only tribute from Ten to be receiving this treatment. Their victors, Arizona and Hector, have a sudden smash of brilliance, with the intent of having them join the Careers. The plan is a bit rushed, now, but there's the drive behind their eyes.

Marcus is still leaning up against the column, looking out, Valencia on the couch, she stirring in her own fumes of anger and frustration. However, something draws her upwards from her seat. She has no idea what it is perhaps except that there's a sense of loneliness in her district partner. One he might've placed there himself, but there nonetheless. Valencia is a team player, to her chagrin, and it is indeed, giving it some thought, why she gets up from the couch.

When she reaches the distant column, Marcus inhales and exhales. The Capitol skyline is beautiful, lit up in a constellation of light and buildings, a plethora of scarlets and golden rays dotting the horizon. There's laughter, cheering, even jeering, they can hear it due to being so close to the ground in proximity to the others. All this excitement in a world that never sleeps. Valencia feels perturbed by it, a strange chill washing over her skin.

"It's nearly midnight and they're still partying..." Marcus whispers, almost out of disgust. "Just listen to them. It makes me sick."

She looks over at her fellow Career - _ex-Career? -_ and frowns. "I thought you wanted this kind of life?"

"Not this _kind_ ," he emphasizes, motioning his hands outwards to it. "Their every waking thought is dedicated to these Games."

"Ours were too," and then that doesn't right. " _Are_ too," Valencia corrects.

"I think for a whole different reason though," Marcus disagrees, shaking his head. He's still dressed in his handsome Interview outfit, suave red and black suit, hair dolled up, a bit of eyeshadow around the eyes. It is a stylistic choice, he claims. "We're doing it for survival. They- it is _all_ entertainment for them. The reapings, the revealing of tribute scores, watching the Interviews, watching us all die..." his voice cracks at the end, a real part of him that he probably didn't want to expose then. Valencia steps back a bit, eyeing him peculiarly. He coughs, readjusting his tie. "If I win, I won't partake in this like they do."

Valencia raises an eyebrow. Marcus didn't say ' _when he wins',_ he said, _'if I win...'_ and his voice trails off slightly. In the span of a training session, a split decision to leave, an interview, and the evening, she sees her district partner go through a loose transformation. Perhaps not permanent, perhaps not even happening where he realizes it himself, what he is going through, but it is all coming out just the same. "Are you still thinking about splitting from us?" She closes her eyes, pleading to herself, _"Say no. Just say no and all is right with the world..._ "

"I don't know," he looks over at her for the first time all evening, and she has to remind herself that they're the same age, still teenagers, not even young adults, learning to grow up in this bizarre world. He gives her a slight return to character smile, teeth-filled and all. "Depends on what my grace period is to be let back in."

She hasn't given this too much of a thought. It should be that if he leaves he's out, but she is simply unable to grant that request for the others. The rage is palpable between the others, Milor being the only one that is keeping his head level, trying to assess the situation. Maisey and Carrion especially seem to thirst for Marcus's blood the most, but she is going to have to quell that somewhat. However, the Careers were all meant to be together, from 1, 2, and 4, outsiders or not. If he ends up killing any of them - Milor, Persephone, Maisey, Carrion, Victoria, or Hero - in the bloodbath, the immediate reprieve is gone and he'll never be able to join again. "If you spare us during the bloodbath, I give you until the 3rd day to find us. I'll let you rejoin then, no matter how many of us there are."

He straightens himself from the column, rubbing his nose with his knuckle. "Deal."

"Deal of what, exactly?" Valencia furrows her eyebrows.

"I'll go solo until then," Marcus says. "As a test to see if I can survive on my own when the inevitable break up of the Careers happens. If I die before I rejoin you, then know it wasn't mean to be. If I do rejoin you, you'll hopefully have an eight man strong Career pack, and we'll run over everyone else in our paths."

She doesn't quite like that idea, but Valencia wants to try and extend her grace as far as she can without becoming obsolete, or a pushover. Valencia can easily kill Marcus, she knows this. If anyone else in the alliance has a problem with it, she's sure they'd love to walk off a bite from her sword. He begins to walk back over to his room, undoing his tie, undoing everything about him that seems to work, unwinding and unknotting the bits he no longer wants or needs.

"Good night, Marcus," she says, voice barely rising above a hushed whisper.

He doesn't respond back.

* * *

 ** _Deacon Fincher: District 3 Male P.O.V (13)_**

* * *

He has a headache. He doesn't even know to describe it all too much except that there's a sharp, stinging pain in his head caused by madam truly sitting on the couch in front of him, as he paces the room, brow bent in frustration, Rochelle sitting down and hugging a pillow for protection from his insensible rage. He thinks he's making leeway, that he's able to forgive her for the rudeness she exhibits on the train. She even apologizes, hell, on just yesterday she apologizes for her terrible behavior, but then when Pollux allows her to have the stage, she lets him have it.

A disappointment?

Deacon is pretty sure Rochelle could've said any other word; she could've called him a homosexual - not that there's anything wrong with it, of course - or weak, or frightened, or unimpressive... but a _disappointment?_ She does it before he goes on anyways, to ruin whatever little piece of credibility he might've had and now it is ruined, ripped to shreds. His interview is spent him babbling over words, he trying to recover from whatever preconceived notion the audience now has of him. That he's a disappointment. Any other descriptor would've worked, as he'd be somehow able to even defend it. If he's weak, Deacon proves that he is but he makes it up in mental intellect. Frightened? He's thirteen. Everyone has common fears. Unimpressive? He is able to lie and say that there are standards he just hasn't reached. Disappointment?

That covers a wide variety of areas. Not only does it seem like he is a disappointment to himself, his district partner all of a sudden feels the same sentiment.

He pauses, squeezing the bridge of his nose with his fingers. The headache is starting to become a problem, and he never receives them. He never receives them; he's always calm and collected and doing _okay,_ not whatever... not whatever _this_ is. "You have no idea how badly I want to punch you in the face." That might be a bit uncalled for, Deacon realizes, but he's pretty sure his district partner, who is usually supposed to be _on_ his side and not with the enemies, regardless of one victor surviving or not, and she's thrown him into the wolves. She's prepared his empty grave.

Rochelle hugs the pillow to her chest. "I'm sorry! I was just being honest!"

Her saying that ticks a switch in his head, and a few bolts come loose. " _Honest?"_ he screeches. "You actually feel that way about me? Rochelle!" Deacon throws his hands up in the air. "You're supposed to be on my side and instead you made me look like a damn joke!" the male hangs his head low, chuckling to himself. "And to think I wanted to become allies with you."

"You scored a four," she says, and it is as if it is supposed to hurt. What is with her being against him like this? He does not anticipate this sort of friction between them. He knows that not every district partner pair becomes the best of friends, but this is taking things to a whole new level.

"And you got a three!" he snaps sharply. "You scored less than me, therefore I am better than you." Rochelle's lip falters, and for a split second he's worried that she's going to burst into tears. That only adds fuel to the fire, oxygen for the flames to grab at, and he points a finger at her, all accusatory. "Oh no you don't. You do not get to turn on the water works and all of a sudden that makes me forgive you. What you did was unforgivable."

Despite her entire body seeming to convulse with sadness, Rochelle jerks her head to the side, glaring up at Deacon. "It isn't my fault that you're pathetic."

It is almost like a sucker punch to the gut. In fact, that is what it is exactly feels like. Deacon stumbles back onto the floor, the action more violent than he anticipates. Her sobs go a bit silent, she looking over the pillow. Deacon does not have it in him to even stand back up, he laying on his back looking up at the ceiling, her words taking all the life out of him. Because, it then occurs to him.

What if she's right?

What if Rochelle is right? What if Deacon Fincher extraordinaire, at thirteen years old, is pathetic?

She gets up off the couch, going to lie down next to him, in a strange sudden sense of bonding. He doesn't have the energy to tell her to go away, or to even tell her off. It is almost as if he doesn't want her to. Deacon isn't so sure he knows what he wants anymore, he isn't sure what anyone will want. He doesn't want to die. He doesn't want to be in the arena alone. However, as the seconds stretch into minutes and the minutes into hours and the hours into days, it is starting to look like that very ominous future, bones snapped, head twisted the wrong way, a Career looming over him... and that is a future he is terrified about.

Rochelle is still hugging the pillow. "I'm sorry," but does she mean it? "I shouldn't have called you pathetic. You aren't pathetic, Deacon," his district partner looks down at her body, and he looks over at her, hands at his stomach. "I think most of what I say is just me projecting it onto others. I- I have really bad self-confidence issues. I thought everyone in the audience tonight was laughing at me, calling me ugly and a whore and-"

"You aren't any of those things," Deacon interrupts her. "You aren't ugly Rochelle. The audience really liked you." He doesn't know why he even says that to her. She's been rude to him ever since they met.

"Thank you."

Deacon swallows heavily. "Despite that... I don't think it'd be best for us to become allies in the arena. I think we need to stay our separate ways. We just... we wouldn't work," it is painful for him to admit that, as it is him giving a bit of himself out to be criticized, to come forth and say that he is not blameless in this realization. Deacon does not reveal himself like that often, and with a honest person like Rochelle, it is like he has circled a part of his side for her to just take a spear and jab it at him.

She doesn't respond at first. He's sure she's dozen off after a few seconds, but then, "I agree."

He stays silent, keeping his mouth closed. Neither one of them do anything else, talking or otherwise, they just laying down in the middle of the living room, they looking at the ceiling together, Deacon imagining what the arena is going to look like, what a possible avenue of teaming up with Rochelle despite all their flaws... and what he sees for both answers is nothing. A murky black sea, a cloud of intrigue and confusion with nothing to blow it away.

That scares him, slightly.

Is he a disappointment?

Only time tomorrow will tell.

* * *

 ** _Lowelle Sable: District 6 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

Insomnia does not run in her family. It is the truth. Yet, for some reason, Lowelle Sable is unable to sleep. She looks up at the plaster ceilings, having turned the speakers on in the corner of the bedroom to play the sound of rain falling, on the background of a rainforest. There's all these primitive calls in the night, from tigers and lions, beasts with fangs that are as long as her forearm, black eyes bearing out from a peal of darkness, lustrous fur of a puma that stalks its prey... and these creatures fill her mind. She's spent nearly all evening scrutinizing her notebook.

It is a new ballfield, now, though, as she has to incorporate Corvus into the picture. Again, she writes him off as someone she can easily get to her side, and even easily kill if it comes to that, but she's still not all too competent with the blade as she'd like. She's probably going to have to do hunting in the night, whereas the Careers usually tend to do theirs in the day. A blade across the throat, whether done by an untrained or trained hand is still a blade slit across the throat. No one is surviving that.

She's surprised to hear Corvus open up like that, and a bit more surprised at the display of clear affection for Pollux on stage earlier. She gets a hint at it, watching his face study the other guys in the training center, where the eyes seem to linger a bit longer on the derriere than what normal circumstances allot for, which she finds humorous. However, she's a girl, and she isn't sure it'd be entirely too ethical to even use Corvus's sexuality as a means to get back at him and disarm him, to use it as an advantage.

 _Unethical?_ Her mind taunts her. _Using Corvus's sexuality against him would be unethical? What isn't unethical? Killing him?_

Lowelle flinches at that, sitting upright and throwing off the covers, breaking out into a cold sweat. Where did that thought come from? Everything is hitting her at once, now that she is unable to go to bed. She doesn't get nightmares, they aren't an occurrence with her, but she's pretty sure that if she tries to sleep, her inner consciousness will try to conjure up some phantom to torment her thoughts.

It is an element she has to confront at some point. Killing. She looks over at the night stand where her journal is, all the mechanisms of her brain vomited out onto those pages, written in cerulean ink out of a ballpoint fountain pen. Every tribute's weakness that she can conjure up speaking of weapons wise, tribute scores, and when the interviews are over, Corvus heading straight to his room to crash for the night, she goes and writes down about every interview she watches, some blurring together, but there are evident pictures between all of them, evident links that she only needs to think long and hard about in finding a common element.

A few arena suggestions run around, as Lowelle, before getting under the covers spends about ten minutes scrolling through the ambient sounds playlist, stopping between 'crowded downtown', which she is sure would be audio of Capitol citizens walking around and chattering to each other, the other 'rainforest', and she's pretty sure the sounds she is hearing, with tigers and lions and other fantastical monsters is not exactly fitting for a rainforest, but the rain is indeed there. These two choices are what she's narrowed it to. Either it'll be a rainforest, but not quite a jungle, or some sort of tourist attraction that people flocked to. Halfway through sleep, as every tribute has to be up by nine in the morning, the ambience will change, and there will be the dumb voices of Capitol citizens filling her head.

She isn't confident for tomorrow, unlike whatever the rest say. Lowelle is scared shitless; she's scared to die, she's terrified to kill someone, and she's desperate for home. Getting reaped, no matter with how much prepping she feels like she does is enough, nor does it prepare her for the minimum ten days she'll be spending in getting back to District 6, surviving.

Lowelle plops back onto her pillows, comforting and luxurious, wrapped up in silver and ivory and silk. She squeezes her eyes shut, wanting them to stay closed forever. She could try and hide from the Peacekeepers in the morning, couldn't she?

Her eyes pop back open.

Screw this.

 _Screw this._

Lowelle throws the covers off, getting to her feet, stretching and sighing. It is really late, nearly one in the morning, and she is unable to sleep. She can say it now, the Sable family must have insomnia or something.

She opens the door to her bedroom, going across the hall to Corvus's room. It is a daring attempt, she knows that her district partner likes his so-called beauty sleep, in which she knows that there are days where Lowelle requires every single second slumber affords her, as wrinkles do not just go away because she prays for them too. If he isn't up and she awakes him, she'll simply go back to bed. Lifting her knuckle to the closed door, Lowelle raps against it. It seems like the echo is deafening, clattering on and on and awakening the entire building, but that is just her being in her own head.

It is opened just a few seconds later, rather quick timing. She jumps, and then recomposes herself. Corvus stands in the doorway, his hair all scattered to the wind, but he doesn't look like he's gotten a lick of sleep.

"Hey..." he says.

"Hey," she nods back.

"Couldn't sleep?" Corvus asks. She gives another nod. Lowelle must admit that her district partner is cute - if he wasn't gay, _oh the horror!_ \- "Me either."

"Can I join you?" Lowelle really hopes that didn't just come across as desperate. It then takes her a second to realize that Corvus isn't wearing a shirt. His body is _jacked._ Though his frame isn't as large as Carrion's or Milor's due to his age, there are muscles that Lowelle knows even the Careers couldn't even touch. It is almost comical that the end of her sentence, the 'you', seems to trail off into oblivion.

Corvus looks back into his room, then back at her, which since then she's recovered from the temporary female teenage dream. "Sure," he agrees, widening his door and Lowelle steps in, he still having his lights on, bed still made nice and neat... as if he's been up and waiting for her to come in the first place.

He closes the door, and Lowelle doesn't return to her room for the remainder of the evening.

When the Avoxes find them the next day to wake her up to get ready, the two of them are sleeping together, locked arm in arm, almost romantically.

* * *

 ** _Alexandra Quinn: District 11 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

"I'm in," she says. She doesn't even have to hear that much. Alexandra doesn't have to hear his entire life story to already agree with the proposition brought forward. She's standing on District 12's floor, arms crossed over her chest, the Capitol night sky just a blur of lights on the horizon, and she's starting to get to the point where her positive façade is beginning to break. She needs sleep. She doesn't expect to be on another District's floor for much longer. "I'll join the alliance."

Colt blinks in surprise, the District 12 male standing up against the counter. Gaia is over on the other side of it in the kitchen, teaching an Avox how to write their name; it is almost adorable, after the sudden rise in Gaia's determination. Alexandra doesn't return to her own floor for long, as there's Caiden on her floor, and she doesn't want to sit with someone who might have tried to poison her. "But I haven't fully explained-"

"Doesn't matter," Alexandra shakes her head. "You've already got Gaia, Marissa, and Rochelle on board, so clearly you're doing something right," she shrugs. "Besides, I need a group myself. Caiden and I aren't going to be working together, but that wasn't much of a surprise."

She's so certain that her district partner's nice act is just that, an act. There is no way someone can smile at her like that, give her food which he takes from the buffet table, which may be a reason to exact punishment, she isn't sure, and then drop a bomb on her like that. Alexandra screams, scurrying away from the toilet as fast as she can, skin still on fire, her throat burning, the Avox's hands trying to hold her back so she doesn't trip. Whatever is stuck in the toilet bowl, that black core of purple... whatever it is, that isn't normal, and it certainly didn't come from the Capitol.

However, despite after retching up the apple, Alexandra doesn't flee from the room. She walks back over to the apple that had burned her skin, the one that was sitting on Caiden's dresser, looking all pretty, and at the stain on the wall. It is black, like cinders from a burnt down house, or ashes falling after a volcanic eruption. When she presses a finger up against the wall, gingerly expecting it to agonize her flesh again, nothing happens except that the dark powder smears. There's a strange odor to it, almost like urine. She nearly retches again at the thought of Caiden pissing all over the apple, but it is odd, if that is even the case, that it didn't smell of urine. The apple didn't smell like anything at all, yet when she threw it at the wall, the blackness appeared.

Alexandra is so shaken up about it that she locks herself in her room, not coming out for dinner when prompted by her mentor, or even by Caiden's voice. A sweet voice, a siren of death, as she's certain he's certain that she's been injured or has an encounter with the apples he left behind. The demonic piece of vomit that came from her throat is from the apple he gave her, and the burning agony her hand endures is due to the one resting on the counter. She throws a pillow at her closed door, screaming at him to leave her alone.

Despite all of this, Alexandra is unable to bring herself to get into his face. It is a power play. A mighty damn good one at that, as Alexandra is now looking behind herself all the time, constantly, consistently expecting him to pop out at any corner and throw another piece of fruit at her. Not only is she pretty sure Caiden tried to poison her, he uses her favorite fruit, which she's also sure she never told him... so how would he know?

It is immediately confirmed, Caiden is a psychopath.

The tension in Colt's shoulders seem to disappear immediately. "Thank you for saying yes. I'm glad you agreed."

"No problem," she says almost absentmindedly, her head turned to the side, she not even looking at Colt or giving him the time of day. She almost expects that it is going to be a victor who wins by going alone sort of situation. She's eager to get back at Caiden now, and having an alliance only makes things fifty thousand times easier. Alexandra has no idea what her district partner is up to right now, but she's pretty confused as to how Caiden, if poison is indeed his main weapon, is going to be able to smuggle something like that into the arena, or to even use it.

Her skin goes cold when it occurs to her that he managed to poison her all the same, outside of the arena, and she has no idea about it... but it almost feels different, the vibe of him doing that to her.

"Why did you say yes, though?" Colt asks her, he breaking her from the prison that is the mind. One wanders in, they might not be able to get back out.

There's no point in hiding the reason why she agrees. Alexandra knows that the best way to get out of the arena alive is to make as many friends as you can and hope that they could save your skin when the time is right, to then abandon them when that time is suitable. However, Alexandra isn't a monster like her district partner; she'd give them fair warning, and try to prep them the best she could.

"I'm pretty sure that my district partner, Caiden, tried to poison me yesterday in a play to show his power," she says, quite coldly. Her words cause Gaia to stop her exercise with the Avox, and Colt's eyes widen.

"Is that who you were talking about in your interview?" Gaia asks.

"The very one," Alexandra nods.

"And..." Colt trails off. There's a connective piece of reasoning behind it, behind why she'd want to join. It might not be written on the wall as easily as she'd prefer, but it is there.

"Me joining an alliance is going to help me get back at him," Alexandra says with resolve, setting her shoulders back. "Caiden pissed off the wrong district partner. I'm going to kill him," her eyes glow with the fires of retribution, a blazing black flame. "And you guys are going to help me."

Alexandra Quinn is no wilting flower.

She's a rose prepped with thorns.

* * *

 ** _Persephone Castor: District 2 Female P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

What Milor did on stage tonight inspires Persephone. She's best friends with the guy after all, but she's never known his secret. She's seen it play out some, like earlier before the interviews took place, the way he is transfixed by Carrion, but Persephone narrows it down to the fact that she's been so focused on training that nothing about his sexuality occurs to her. In place of it, she rudimentarily figures that he simply doesn't go for anyone romantically, focused like her, as more often than not, the guys who are working on becoming victors in the Hunger Games also take their own side flings. It is not uncommon for the occasional male volunteer for District 2 to have some other girl in the district be expecting a child soon before they go off into the arena, and then tragically die and do not come home, leaving that newborn infant fatherless.

However, as she looks at him, as she looks at Milor, all she feels is pride. Like her, with her insecurities at probably not being good enough, at not having enough to what it takes - not like she can quit now, unfortunately, a thought that hits her a bit too late - Milor has the same problem. They aren't the typical Career pair. They both like each other, as she's seen it for years when a pair is at each other's throats, like Valencia and Marcus, or Maisey and Carrion who weren't even supposed to be here in the Capitol, due to the Academy skipping them entirely, the two tributes from Four were total strangers beforehand.

The two of them are sitting on chairs at the counter of the kitchen, in the living room, Hale and the other victor asleep, it nearly midnight, and neither one of them have decided to go to sleep yet. They aren't laughing and goofing out, they're simply talking. Persephone cannot think of the last time she just had a normal conversation. Hours before the reaping, her mother gives her all of those sexual tips to try and get into Milor's head, but clearly, now with it being admitted openly by him of his sexuality, it is clear that there's no hope for her in that avenue. Persephone isn't even sure if her mother told her that she's loved when they say goodbye. Any conversation with anyone here in the Capitol has been inspired by the Games, be it Valencia or Maisey, or with Hale on being coached on how to kick ass and take names.

This is entirely unlike her at all.

She's sipping something called ginger ale, appreciating the different, sweet taste that hits her tongue. He's opted for water, ever so the prepared one, ever so the guy who is trying to make sure he's on top of everything. Persephone wonders why she is so unconfident in her abilities, which are clearly there, but then she looks at Valencia scoring an eleven, or the guys who just exude muscular weight. Even the new joiners of Hero and Victoria are amazing in their own fighting ability. While Maisey is a point lower than her training score wise, Maisey is incredibly strong. Put a weapon in her hands, something that can be thrown: knife or spear... damage is going to be done.

Persephone stops stirring her glass, looking at Milor who prefers to chug out of it by holding it to his lips. Then, out of the blue, "I think you're one of the bravest people I've ever met."

He stops drinking, setting the glass down, wiping at the back of his mouth. "I don't believe that, Persephone."

"No, you _are,_ " she scoots her chair over closer to him. "For how long I've known you, I wouldn't have even guessed that about yourself," Persephone grabs Milor's hand, bringing it closer to her body. Her hand is warm, his shockingly cold, and he looks up at her, electric blue eyes firing off information at a thousand miles a second. "You told that to every single person in Panem. You told the truth about your father, which I am certain he now has people knocking down his door trying to get at him for being a terrible parent. That takes bravery, Milor. Bravery you have."

Milor doesn't know what to say, except that he doesn't know why she grabs his hand. It is a kind gesture, most certainly, but he doesn't need it. There's nothing to him that requires all this love. Persephone knows it is one of her fatal flaws. She cares too much for people. Why volunteer for the Hunger Games, which most certainly requires her to kill people she may get close to... she isn't certain of that. If it is anyone else besides Milor as her district partner, she wouldn't be able to admit if she'd feel the same way, pride wise, about them. There's a humanness to him that she appreciates.

A humanness that she wishes to find one day in herself.

Persephone has to remind herself, at which she's trying every day to do but is unable to, that she's enough. She may not be enough for Hale, or up to Valencia's standards, or enough for the society of the world around her that they expect a Career from District 2 to be, but that doesn't matter. Persephone Castor is enough for Persephone Castor, and whenever she starts to disbelief this universal truth, she bites down on her lip as she hard as she can.

She sometimes draws blood, but this is so she is prepared for it. There's going to be carnage in the arena tomorrow. Nothing pretty. Nothing pretty at all.

Milor drops his hand from hers, looking down at the floor. "Thank you, Persephone," he says.

"Was it bad?" she asks. "With your father?"

There is a fear behind his eyes, an unspeakable one, a type of emotion and look in his eyes that sends chills racing all up and down Persephone's spine. Her interview is right before his, and he more than likely stole the thunder from everyone on that stage, and when she's listening to his stories, the truth he says and reveals, it causes her to bring a hand to her mouth out of terror, out of fright. The way Milor describes his father beating him with whatever the man could find: shoes, fists, even a stick, once... or how he locks Milor in a five by five room and doesn't let him out for two days, and to even be sent away to some sort of school to get him 'straight'... it bowls Persephone over with nausea. How her best friend could be treated so coldly, and she had no idea about it.

"Yeah," Milor swallows heavily, his eyes glassy, teary-eyed. "Yeah... it was bad, Seph." She's never heard that nickname from him before, but it works. He wipes at his eyes, pushing back his chair, finishing his glass of water. "I'm going to go to the roof."

Persephone takes another sip of her ginger ale, moving a bit faster than what her body might allow. "Do you want me to go with you?"

"I'd prefer to be alone," he says.

She stops in her tracks, slightly wounded if she is to be honest. However, she knows why... Persephone is having him draw some unrequited piece of his past out of him for the second time, perhaps where he shouldn't be under fire to tell the truth about it again. Milor walks off into the elevator, the doors opening and closing, leaving Persephone Castor as the only person awake on District 2's floor.

It is time for her to retire and go sleep... it's a big day tomorrow and every warrior needs sleep.

As she wanders off, leaving her glass of ginger ale on the counter, wetness slides down her cheeks. It isn't droplets of condensation from the glass... they're tears.

It has finally hit her, right now, right then in the living room at the bar that to get home, to get back to her mother, to make herself good enough to be loved... to become victor of the 100th Hunger Games, the 4th Quarter Quell, Persephone is going to have to come home over Milor Drusus's dead body. Problem is...

She's willing to do it, too.

* * *

 ** _Edwin Bishop: District 5 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

This is meant to be a learning exercise. Well, he hopes it is. Edwin hasn't left Annabellina's side all night, he sitting with her on the carpeted floor in the living room. She is still dressed all beautifully in her interview outfit, he changing back to a more relaxed pair of shorts and simple shirt, but the fact that Annabellina hasn't gotten off the floor is starting to make him nervous.

Everything about her spells a disaster waiting to happen. Even from the first day of training, from when she switches her name all the time when talking to him, to the line about there being fire in which she's born out of, like Athena coming from Zeus's skull sort of mythos, Edwin's skin crawls whenever he is near her. Something about her perplexes him, it nicking at the scientific aspect of his brain, but there's nothing else about her that is fascinating.

He's terrified, just hours ago, when there's a sudden slam against one of the walls in his room, coming from hers, enough to have him stir awake out of the current novel he is engrossed in, as there's nothing worse than sitting around and allowing him to get psyched out of performing well in the arena. When he runs in, Annabellina's hands wrapped around her own throat, her own face starting to turn blue, his blood turns to ice, and everything becomes all about saving her, saving Annabellina, making sure she's okay. When she sobs in his arms, hugging him, Edwin isn't necessarily flooded with relief like he expects. There's a boundary all of a sudden drawn, as he didn't take her recovery to be celebratory. He is holding her out at arm's distance.

It is an unwritten rule somewhere, in some room, on some shelf, in a dusty book, a code. District partners take care of district partners, they try to find common ground... district partners don't kill district partners. Part of that is why Edwin is compelled to her, despite the clear showings of some mental instability. His mind pokes at a few thoughts, but behind it, there's a certain jealousy that rears its ugly head in.

Comparing himself to Annabellina, she's exactly what the Hunger Games would want. The Games, the _Capitol,_ more specifically, want someone entertaining, and what is his district partner if not that? Edwin can often look down at his own body, where the only thing that sticks out is his glasses, but then he looks at her, cannon fire going off even when every soldier has gone home, and there's a sadness that fills the moat in his heart. He's nothing with Annabellina on the rise. He isn't entertaining. He isn't victor material. The fact that someone as smart as he has become is even thinking of that means that Edwin Bishop has fallen far.

Everything builds to earlier, with the training scores. He's jealous that she's scored higher than him, already drawing the attention of people in Panem everywhere, putting him at a disadvantage. What did this girl from District 5 do to score just one level behind a Career?

He is sitting across from her, trying to get past all of that, trying to bridge an alliance now, trying to forge on ahead and make sure she's okay. He almost doesn't want to leave her alone, terrified he'll wake up and find her dead in the corner.

"Are you okay?" he asks.

Nothing awry has happened for the last few hours. Annabellina seems to be Annabellina, refreshing as that can be. "I- I think so."

"Are you still in pain?" he doesn't have to mention _why,_ that is evident enough from his tone.

"Well, I punched myself in the gut," she cracks a light smile, almost uncharacteristic of her to do so. "Hard to not still feel that."

Edwin shifts closer, their knees touching together in the spaces provided, as both are sitting on the carpet with their legs crossed together. "Annabellina, I am going to need you to be honest with me. What happened earlier today, in your room?"

His district partner closes her eyes, sighing. He is almost expecting, when she opens them again, for her eyes to be a different color. Her body trembles, he feeling it along the connectivity at the knees. "I- I have MPD."

"Multiple personality disorder," Edwin repeats back to her, and then it clicks. His hunch is right. "Schizophrenia..." he trails off.

She nods. "Yeah. That," Annabellina looks down at her hands. "I touched an electrical wire when I was very young. Part of me was born with fire, like I said two days ago." The way his district partner looks at her skin is almost as if Annabellina is anticipating the wounds to reappear, for the burns on her hand to all of a sudden come out and scar her flesh once more.

"How- how many are inside of you?" he really hopes that didn't come across as insulting. He's scared of her, scared of what she'll do, what she'll say. If it will even be Annabellina doing it in the end.

"Five," she replies.

"Five..." Edwin echoes, his heart hammering in his chest. Oh... oh _shit._ That certainly isn't good. He's pretty certain he's seen two of them already, maybe a third.

"There's Anna, which is most like me now," his district partner counts on her fingers. It is almost disconcerting how easily she just says this. "Smart, logical, tries to be the leader. Then there's Elli, who is completely book smart, but also a bit egotistical," her eyes get a bit glossy at the next. "Belle is flirtatious, artsy... she's who I was tonight on stage. The dancing. Lina is full of sadness," and then it is as if the room drops twenty degrees in a second. "Lastly there's Abe," her voice is ominous. "Full of rage. Angry all the time. Violent. Combatant."

"I've seen Abe, Lina, and Belle, then," Edwin comments. What gives it away, besides the traits, if he's remembered correctly, is that Annabellina has flat out turned into them, saying their names and everything. A bit easy, he supposes. "Can you control them at all?"

Annabellina bites down on her lower lip, nearly hard enough where the skin could go completely off. "Usually one will take the wheel for an extended period of time. I know what I am doing, but more often than not I'm Anna. Controlled. Calm. Collected," she shakes her head. "I've been switching so much recently that I don't know what to do. It's never been bad like this before."

"What happened in your bedroom?"

"They were fighting with each other. Abe tried taking the wheel..." she shudders. "I choked myself because he was choking Belle, and-" she breaks off, closing her eyes. "I didn't know what to do. I couldn't stop him, the others couldn't hold him off."

"I heard you cry out in pain," Edwin slowly moves his hand closer and closer to Annabellina's leg, almost as a gesture to keep her grounded, to keep her centered, to keep her as _Annabellina._

"I tried fighting back," she locks eyes with him. Annabellina's stare is haunting, not just hers, but Lina's, Anna's, Elli's, Abe's, and Belle's all caught with her. "They all were going at one another. Even Elli, and that's when I am the least combative. If one of them got punched, _I_ physically felt the punch. I got thrown forward because Abe chucked Anna across a room..."

Alarms are ringing in his head, but he's going to say it anyways. Code red, code blue, code all of the damn colors in the rainbow! "I'll be honest with you, Annabellina... you scare me. I'm terrified of what you'll say, of what you'll do, of who you might be? You say that you can't control it? That you're at war with yourself in your head? Jesus! How am I supposed to help you with that?"

"I think you keep me grounded... like, that you remind me, of me..." Annabellina says, her voice perking up.

All of a sudden, and Edwin is sure he misses this, she mover forward in her dress, and his district partner is atop him. Her lips are locked with his in a kiss, Annabellina pressing him further into the ground. A croak of surprise catches in his throat, it dissipating away at the action, and he wraps one hand around the small of her back. Her hands are gentle against his chest, a daintiness to her touch, and then everything breaks. Edwin closes his eyes for a second, almost dreamily, before opening them in a flash. Annabellina lifts up off of him, placing a cold hand against the side of his face. Even with all the beauty, even with her kissing him... what's real?

He's terrified of her. Nothing she does will change that.

Edwin swallows heavily. That's his first kiss, maybe even hers too, but he's moving over that fact. He shifts her off of him, Annabellina's face twisting into a myriad of unreadable emotions, but it seems that she stays herself, no other personality taking the wheel so to speak. Edwin's tongue feels heavy in his mouth.

"That isn't you, Annabellina," he whispers, his heart breaking in two. "That's just one of your other _you's…"_ Edwin licks his lips. "You don't care for me like that..."

He pushes past her, dotting at his eyes, getting rid of the tears. Edwin is certain that Annabellina stands up after him, perhaps to follow, but he _runs_ away from her. There are visions of glory on his horizon, and unfortunately she and the rest of her isn't in the picture.

Edwin can't do this anymore.

* * *

 **Well, I wrote this in entirely one sitting and I can't believe it. I am exhausted haha, from like 9:00 PM to 1:00 AM I just churned out this chapter, with maybe an hour break total at different times. Well, ladies and gents, that was Chapter #21: Visions of Glory, with points of view from Valencia, Deacon, Rochelle, Alexandra, Persephone, and Edwin. Which one was your favorite to read? Which pairing of tributes (not romantically, guys *looks at Romeo pointedly*) was your favorite?**

 **There's only six more points of view left to reach double wise, in a manner just like this chapter, and I am super excited to start writing it. We're almost there guys, at the Bloodbath, and the start of the Games, and I can't believe we're nearly there, almost to the point where thinking about it is bringing tears to my eyes. Make sure, while you guys wait for updates, to go read LongingForRomeo's SYOT, Tempestas the 189th Games. At the point of me writing this, we're down to the final ten, and my tribute Jerry Kapper from District 6 is still alive. I know I've plugged it a lot in this story already, but seriously, it's good, so give it a read while you wait for my updates.**

 **Next chapter is going to be #22: Speaking in the Silence (also the name of a dance solo I created for myself; just love the title), which is the last chapter before the hammer stroke will fall. Please review, as I know there's been a lot of juicy content on the horizon. I love you guys so much! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	22. Speaking in Silence (Night Before II)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #22: Speaking in Silence. This it guys... this is it, the last pre-games chapter before the bloodbath, and things are gonna be collapsing. With Chapter #21: Visions of Glory, Valencia and Marcus came to an agreement, Deacon shunned Rochelle, Lowelle and Corvus bonded, Alexandra made allies in District 12, Persephone commented on Milor's bravery, and Edwin distanced himself from Annabellina. This time - sounds like a TV show haha - there will be even more drama and even more craziness if that is even possible. Please enjoy Chapter #22: Speaking in Silence.**

* * *

 ** _Blake Hanley: District 9 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

"You did what?" exclaims Blake, he sitting up straight on the couch, he starting at his district partner, Marissa, who had just come back from some excursion to District 12's floor. There's a certain air behind her now, something he is unsure about, as there's been a lot of facets about her that she's been revealing over the last few days. All he sees when looking at her is a world entrenched in scarlet, a world coated in crimson and copper droplets that run down pasty skin, white flesh that is ripped at the seams by a ferocious Rottweiler, and he is unable to stare at her for much longer. He's already written her off as someone who is going to die; there's no way she's going to be saved from the games, especially if he wants to get home himself.

He is still ticked off at himself for using a bow in the training sessions. He could've at least gotten a seven, maybe even an eight if he picks up a sword instead, but something directs him to look at Maisey with Marissa, noticing a sensuality in the way Marissa moves her hips as she's getting the instruction. When he follows the Career's advice, which he is sure is also leased to him as well, Blake notes mild success. Where that success is in the private session for Lewlyn, he has no idea. Now he sits in his room, fuming, pissed off that he's missed his mark.

It could work, however, Blake realizes suddenly. It could work where he looks like an underdog, someone to root for, and he is very grateful that Marissa didn't throw him under the bus to Pollux, where she most certainly has the free liberties to do so. That is until...

"I'm in an alliance," she says casually, stepping down onto the tiled floor of the apartment. There's a new air of confidence around her - although Marissa has always seemed confident, this comes across as purely arrogant. The nerve of it all - and she sits down in one of the chairs across from her. This clearly is a decision done without any sort of victor collaboration.

"With who?" he is trying to keep his voice as calm as possible. Perhaps this won't be so easy, depending on what she says. There's no way she'd be able to get into the Careers. Yes, Maisey got a four, but there's strength in that girl, that crazed, _crazed_ girl. When Blake looks over at his district partner, that same strength just isn't there. How is he supposed to find any of it there?

"District 12, the girl from 3, and the girl from 11," Marissa counts off on her fingers.

Blake runs those names by in his head. " _Colt and Gaia, Rochelle, and Alexandra. Plus Marissa. One guy, four girls,"_ he then scowls at the information. "So, you joined some sort of like... harem? One guy, four girls?"

Marissa scrunches up her nose in disgust. "What? Gross, Blake!"

"I'm sure Colt is only being innocent here. That he wants to protect you four in the arena."

"Those precise words," she points at him.

He leans forward, resting his elbow on his knee. "And what about me? That I am just chopped liver? I assume I'm not a part of it?"

"Nope," Marissa crosses her legs, leaning back. It is the smirk that does it, the one playing on her face. She's taunting him, that skeevy little _bitch._ He knows that is extremely rude to call her that, but Blake is sick and tired of her entitled attitude. He'd love to wipe it straight off the face of the Earth, now.

Blake leaps to his feet, voice thunderous. "You just threw me under the rug then? What if I really want to be in an alliance, huh?"

She holds her arms out wide, as if she really could care less about his problems, which by the way she tilts her head, is more than likely true. Blake knows it's because he didn't sleep with her last night, like she asks him to, when she comes into his room, nightgown at her feet, underwear not far from it. However, he sees that she isn't herself, _herself,_ Marissa is sleepwalking, clearly not control of her actions yet when he manages to rouse her from the strange spell of slumber, she doesn't apologize and pull up her pants.

A fire revitalizes itself in her and she playfully presses a hand up against his chest. Blake wrenches the hand off of him; he isn't here for that with her or with anyone else. There's someone back home for him, how _dare_ she.

"Not my problem anymore, Blake. If you wanted to be allies with me, you should've said something. We trained together, sure," Marissa easily has the most punchable face on the planet right about now, and the way he is making a fist, part of Blake wants to do it. Besides, how different could it be when he grabs a sword and cuts her in two at the Bloodbath tomorrow? "But beyond that, you didn't want to have anything to do with me. An opportunity landed at my feet and I decided to take it. Don't cry over spilled milk, Blake."

As if she has the ability to be 'preaching' at him at this moment and time. Blake rolls his eyes, stomping away from her and going to his room, slamming the door shut. He is pretty sure that is the most toddler-like thing he's ever done, but he doesn't care anymore. Nothing is going to save anyone from his reach tomorrow with a sword. There's the bulk to prove it, and sadly, the anger inside him that he's trying to bury deep inside. Perhaps it doesn't even need to exist, just in spurts.

Who needs their district partner to succeed in the games, anyway? Who needs any of that?

Blake Hanley doesn't need Marissa Herdier in an alliance, nor does he need her alive.

He simply needs her dead and out of the way, one step closer to winning the Hunger Games.

His message is being spoken in the silence, from the way he stalks out of the living room, Marissa pursing her lips after him, watching her district partner move.

 _Watch your back._

* * *

 ** _Marina Penweather: District 8 Female P.O.V (13)_**

* * *

She's been standing in the shadows of the apartment, unable to go get the urge to stand back up and go back into her room. All she can do is rest her head against a stone column and listen to the very clear sniffles. Sadness is entrenched in her soul, but unlike the one compared to Galiant's. She's upset that he's upset and there's nothing she can do about it. Marina looks out at the Capitol skyline and only sees black, everything out there is lit, but she cannot see past it, all that is there is blackness, sorrow, and death.

Marina cannot stop thinking about her training score. That just proves absolutely inadequacy on all fronts, right? She's pretty sure there's no statistic in the world that can help save her from this plight. All the Capitol sees is a tribute who has been failing with each aspect of the Games. Everyone watching the Interviews know who she is, the tribute that makes the lowest score out of the entire gang, the only one to receive a two... what did she do that is so _bad,_ compared to everyone else? Marina is unable to come up with an answer.

Marina Penweather is the one who has an answer to everything.

As she stands on the side of the stage, looking back at Galiant, there's still a strangeness in her. He doesn't want her around, and yet she is unable to not be drawn towards him after all of this. How handsome he looks in his suit, how her heart falls apart when he begins to scream at the audience and at Pollux. Her heart isn't dark and emotional like his, she's a positive, free spirit, and seeing him collapse... she reciprocates the action.

When she is going through the reaping books, helping the district with last minute prep work on having the reaping prepared, there is a morbidity to writing down her own name on the slips of paper that then is somehow one of the two pieces of paper that the escort draws free from the bowl. It is as if there is a thunderstorm raging at the same time the reaping takes place and time stops everywhere for Marina's mind. She tries thinking back to how she felt, noticing that she has to write down on two-hundred-and-one individual pieces of paper, the name _Galiant Rushmohone._ There's no picture associated with the documentation, and so she fills in his appearance herself, taking him to be her age, maybe twelve years old instead, with bright blonde hair, electric blue eyes, and a sadness that can be read from every pore.

She does not expect Galiant Rushmohone to be the current guy that is crying just a few columns over, completely oblivious that she's even there. Marina should be crying; tomorrow's a emotional, emotionally heavy day that she isn't sure how to exactly prepare for.

That's it. She can't stand listening to Galiant cry any longer.

Marina stands up from her spot, moving just three over, behind her to where he's sitting. Neither one of them changed out of their interview outfits, and she is probably going to sleep in it if she wants, if she's too lazy to switch out of it. Galiant notices her, finally, his face red and puffy, his face glistening with the reflection of light off of fresh tears, and his nose lit up like the streets down below. When he sees her, his brow furrows, he sniffles some, and he turns rigid, facing the window directly.

"Go away," he says, his voice as calm as she's probably ever heard it. He is trying to be mean to her still, despite all they've been through, yet there's no more energy in him, no more of that fight to keep him going. When she doesn't move, Marina not sitting down or walking away, he looks back at her, scowling. "Didn't you hear me? I said go away!"

This has her crouch down. Marina is hesitant to grab one of his hands, but she does it anyways, her own fingers wrapping tandem around his. They're strikingly cold, and she does not expect this, nearly letting go. He looks up at her, and the look that replaces the more momentarily angry one is confusion, shock, and even perhaps stunned. She's unable to make it out perfectly in the shadows. "Haven't you learned by now?" her voice is barely above a whisper. "I'm not giving up on you."

Galiant shakes his head, his throat bulking up from an evident sob he wants to make. "You should..." he shakes his head. "You know I am not getting out of the arena alive. You need to stop trying," the last part is quieter than even her speech. "Marina, you need to start focusing on yourself."

Marina shakes her head back at him, perhaps mockingly, if it can be perceived that way. She is in favor for the one for all, all for one type of mantra, and if she is dragged down by Galiant, so be it. There's much worse she could be enduring right about now. "Galiant... are you saying you're going to kill yourself in the arena?" Everyone knows the rule. You step off of the pedestal too early and landmines blow chunks of the person around the Cornucopia. Surprisingly, as Marina knows this statistic, there isn't a high number of deaths that occur this way. Only seven tributes out of the last good batch of two hundred have actually taken such a leap of faith - or rather lack of faith in themselves - and died that way.

He looks at her like she's crazy. "Kill myself?" Galiant almost looks affronted as if she's even suggest such a thing. "God, no. I don't want to die. I just know that it is going to happen," he swallows heavily. "Some Career is gonna run a blade through me and that's gonna be the end of it. I learned how to use a sword, but they were all too heavy for me."

"All the tesserae?" she doesn't quite understand.

"After one point the district stopped letting me apply for it. After all, it's just my mom and I," Galiant sniffles, wiping at his nose. "How much food could we possibly need, y'know? It got to a certain point where I was just having my name added to the pile. The food they gave us, I- I didn't eat most of it," her district partner hangs his head shamefully. "You can yell at me about that too, like you've yelled at me about everything. There's people starving in Eight and I throw away most of the food the Capitol gave me..." he laughs, looking up at the ceiling. "Most of the swords in the training center I was too weak to even use. My arms couldn't swing it up high..."

Marina wants to yell at him, but all she's feeling now is pity, a strange sense of pity. She sits profile like he is, turning her body in on itself, resting her head against his shoulder. There isn't much she knows to say. It isn't like any of her last moments of help have worked, after all. Galiant Rushmohone is always going to be someone who shoots themselves in the foot, watching the blood pour out of the sole, very well knowing why it happened and still wouldn't do anything to change the past that led to it, the present event, or the future they can possibly foresee.

However, she does know this.

"Galiant," she says to him.

"Yeah, Marina?"

"At least promise me you'll try to fight your way out of a losing battle. Just... just don't give up, okay?"

"I-"

She pinches him as hard as she can in the side, having moved her left hand over her lap to do so, which elicits a hiss from him. It is not like she can punch him and have that do anything effort wise. "I'm serious, Galiant. Promise me that. No matter what happens, no matter who comes after you, you _fight._ "

Galiant takes a deep breath, exhaling and speaking out in the same breath, almost as if he is trying to have Marina not hear the response. "I promise, Marina."

His soft sobs act as the background orchestral sounds for the lasting duration of each other's company.

A blood sun will rise on the horizon, soon.

Neither one speaks in the silence of his cries, but that is okay. Neither one of them needs to say anything.

He's got her back and she's got his.

* * *

 ** _Caiden Grove: District 11 Male P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

Beads of sweat drip down his nose, the heat of his bedroom starting to become a bit insufferable. Caiden knows that he needs to stop and think about himself for a moment, but he doesn't want to, there's matters at hand he needs to accomplish and he is not going to have the morning to finish anything. It has to be done before he goes to sleep, concealed so it isn't taken from him, and kept close on hand so he can use it.

The power play from yesterday comes back to his mind, causing Caiden to grin. He sees the fear behind Alexandra's eyes, the way his district partner counts him out before he even has the ability to show up. He knows that she knows that he knows what he did, but it doesn't matter. She hasn't confronted him yet, and now she's lost her chance, as apparently she is up a floor above their own, chatting with District 12. The act is childish, causing him to snort. There's no need for allies in the arena, they'll all be fickle anyways, they'll all be transitioning between real and fake, more fake than real, and he knows not to get to close.

He wonders how many others who've bought fruit out of his orchard are dead now. The same secretive poison in the apples that Alexandra takes a bite out of and eats is in the same pile at home now, to make sure they work. Caiden supposes he'll be able to find out soon enough when he gets back to District 11 as the victor of the 4th Quarter Quell, something for the district to fear, something for other victors to fear. Every victor he's ever heard of has won through metal blades slicing through flesh and the mutilation of friendships and trust. Although he is probably going to pick up a sword or knife in the arena to aid in the process of securing his victory, there hasn't been a tribute leading themselves to the gilded crown quite like this one.

Under the radar he goes, but when he receives that seven, it has Caiden frowning and rubbing his chin at what this could possibly mean. Now he is going to be considered a target by those who want to look at him. A seven is decent enough for tributes from 11, and given his height and stature, it almost is a given at this point, but Caiden is sure that there will be people wondering why he got a higher score than Alexandra, as she has all the traits of toughness added to her, she has all the traits of kicking ass and taking names written over her, and there's Caiden standing in the corner, waving meekly, shyly nodding, and then slowly dipping a glass vial into someone's drink later on, only to grin as that person writhes on the floor, their neck dissolving like strands of tweed.

Caiden wipes at his brow. He's almost finished.

His mind wanders back to the victor breakdown. Even the ones who use some sort of strategy, it always involves electricity, he's noticed. There's a victor, from One, he's pretty certain, that is roped into the whole volunteer thing but hates killing, kind of like Marcus. When, in the bloodbath, the tribute is forced to protect herself with a blade, she realizes that there is a certain rhythm to it, that tribute turned victor uses ventriloquism to confuse her foes and then stab them to death... and it is glorious.

He cuts his finger accidentally on a piece of the test tube he's holding, Caiden hissing and then he brings his finger to his lip to suck on the blood. He's been tasting his blood for quite some time now, ever since he butters the roll on the train, wondering what it does taste like. It is surprisingly bitter. He isn't expecting the sweetness of a strawberry or anything insane - as if Caiden Grove is insane, he isn't insane... he's a visionary - but the taste is surprisingly tantalizing. His eyes roll to the back of his head, Caiden sighing in ecstasy... the thrill it brings to his veins, the adrenaline.

Only his blood however. He will not be tasting anyone else's blood should they die by his hand. He might not even kill a single person; that's happened before with other victors, but Caiden doesn't really see that on his horizon as the path he will take.

Would he call himself a murderer? Caiden isn't sure. He knows he isn't an insane psychopath, all he does is in the name of science. When it comes out that there's been people who've died due to tasting his apples that have been spruced up as is the language of every good chef, he can easily shrug his shoulders and claim that it's an accident, that there's allergies he's discovering, pesticides coming into light. It is what he is doing, applying pesticides, homemade pesticides actually, to his produce and seeing what can eat it and survive. His stomach is able to survive four of the nineteen he's tasted and tried, and it looks like the latest product, number nineteen, is the one Alexandra vomits up in the toilet.

How else is he supposed to test his trials though? On animals? No, they're too mundane and earthly for the task such as his... he needs a host that can give feedback. The feedback is usually a dissolved throat, however, Caiden watching the person collapse and fidget in his backyard.

Something hits him, a realization. Alexandra and her family have been buying his apples for years, and they haven't noticed any sudden sort of problem. Has she become immune like he has to his own poisons? Caiden frowns, rubbing his chin. That just occurred to him, and now he's curious. There's only one way for that to become possible, however... it looks like he'll require her nonaccidental services once again.

 _Aha,_ finally!

Caiden lifts up a test tube that he's been spending so much time with over the last few days. This is the reason why he's been spending so much time in his room. After all, he certainly isn't being unethical... twenty-three of the people he's met within this time span of being in the Capitol are going to die... and it is somehow going to be wrong that he poisoned them all? He doesn't understand that logic.

The contents in the vial are a beautiful emerald green, bubbles and foam popping out at every bit of open air space they can get, and the liquid looks mesmerizing as he swishes it about. There's another apple on his desk, in which he grabs it, wrenching it over to his side. He slowly, but surely, pours the vial of liquid over the apple. The reaction is immediate.

The outer skin of the apple shrivels up, absorbing the contents poured all over it. However, just a few seconds later, the skin reappears, molding back over it as if there isn't anything wrong with it. Caiden's made sure that the apple this time isn't one that has a solvent which will burn people's hands on contact. He needs the apple to be fresh and look beautiful for the unsuspecting to pick it up and eat it. The apple is good as new, clean as a whistle... no one will be able to tell the difference.

He looks to his left, there being twenty-three more vials of the emerald liquid, one for each tribute. It doesn't have to be just an apple. It could be _anything._

Caiden grins, busting out into manic laughter. Again, Caiden Grove isn't insane.

President Calhoun could already toss out the red carpet and let him walk down it. He believes there is already a new victor for this Hunger Games.

He is silent, but he is deadly. Speaking in the silence is his science, where actions speak a thousand times louder than words.

* * *

 ** _Hero Slade: District 10 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

Whatever buzz he's been feeling over the last few days has worn off, a strange, peculiar somberness setting into Hero's skin. Whenever he looks at Victoria, there isn't that same spark of beauty he thought he saw just under a week ago back on the train. He doesn't know what it is, he really doesn't, but something is itching at the back of his neck, telling him to watch out, telling him to be careful, telling him to pay attention to the signs. What signs? Hero has no idea.

It shouldn't hurt him, but it does, that Victoria has scored one point higher than him. It shouldn't hurt, but it does. It feels like a spike has dug itself in between his sternum, digging down deep and stabbing at the very place that matters most. His heart. It is starting to crack, he can feel an internalized pressure where he can feel the beat drumming underneath his skin, but it is painful, it is perilous, it is disgusting. He wants to throw up all the time, but he is trying to hold it all in. His feelings about Victoria, about the games, about himself and his confidence, about Hector and Arizona... about this whole stupid thing!

He can't go home with her. He is not going to become some Katniss and Peeta from a bygone age. This isn't a possibility anymore, it never has been. Calhoun Rodney is no monster, but he is no forgiving man either... after all, he's ruling and the Hunger Games are happening, aren't they? Hero feels so stupid, he feels like he doesn't amount to anything in this moment and time, and it is tearing him up inside because there is no way he is going to sacrifice his at face attitude with Victoria, who is already able to sense what is going on but is perhaps too timid to ask aloud what it is.

She's always been the stronger out of the two of them, subverting the expectations that it is supposed to be him that remains vigilant in his aims. After all, it is Hero who convinces her to join him, it is him that convinces her they could do it together, but then something on the train shifts in Victoria. He senses it, and now he no longer feels like he has a partner to travel through the games with, anymore. Hero feels alone now, all alone and in the middle of an azure ocean, gray storm clouds above him, he clutching onto some mustard-yellow dinghy, screaming as the surf swallows him whole.

Both of them can win. Hero isn't sure anymore if he's able to get back. The selflessness in him wants to get Victoria across the finish line, where he'll slit his throat and have that be it, where's he done and he's accomplished his goal of saving her. It is why he volunteers in the first place after all, to make sure she doesn't die. Part of him is getting twisted, as if a blade has ensnared his intestines, throwing them around everywhere and cutting him open, killing him softly, killing him painfully. However, he is pretty sure in Victoria's mind that she's separated herself from him a long time ago, that she is no longer playing for both her and his survival.

He wishes, naively, he knows, that at least she could've coordinated that with him beforehand. He hopes, he hopes, oh how he hopes, and that is what Hero is, just a fifteen year-old boy who has his head filled with nonsensical dreams of truth and glory, and no one is helping him come to that realization except for himself, Hero Slade sitting down in front of a mirror, pressing his flesh to other parts of flesh, noticing the changes, noticing the bits of him that break off into the dinky porcelain sink, or the parts he removes willingly. Guts everywhere, his soul shattered, Hero wants to claw at his own head, bash in his own skull.

How could he be _so_ stupid?

It is why, when he and Victoria are hanging out together, still riding the last minute waves of Pollux's energy and interviews, the audience's cheers and roars echoing behind them, he says it. He admits it. He comes clean, so to speak.

"Victoria..." he says, locking his jaw, Hero's gaze solidifying to a corner on the wall. He is unable to look at her as he does this, he doesn't want to see the heartbreak on her face when he admits the truth. It'll change her around; it'll strengthen their bond. It has to. Right? She looks at him with her large chocolate eyes, with her mousy hair, and goodness why did the world create someone so pretty to torment him like this? Victoria is his best friend, and yet he cannot cope with it the way he wants to anymore. "I love you," Hero exhales, and for some reason, he stands up.

He thinks back to earlier, how she's a millimeter away from his face, hands cupping the side of his face, and she's whispering encouragement into his ears. Is this all a ploy? Victoria drops the knife she's using to cut a piece of ham with onto its plate, and she stands up too, reluctance written all over her face. "I know," she responds. That isn't the answer he expects. Not at all, not at _all._ His chest goes icy cold. "I think I've always known," Victoria looks down at her shoes, then into her district partner's face. "I- I hope you know that both of us can't go home, Hero. The Capitol simply won't allow that sort of mistake to happen again."

"Mistake?" Hero echoes, his voice reflecting the deepest level of betrayal he can summon. _Mistake?_ "Us winning wouldn't be a mistake... Victoria. We- we were made to be alongside each other every step of the way..."

She shakes her head, and there's tears in her eyes. "Hero, that future was never for us. I view you as a brother, Hero... I wouldn't be able to love you like that. Not the way you want. It..." she sighs. "If only you didn't join me here. I'd have fought back like hell to get back to you, and we'd be alongside each other forever... but..." she stops speaking, Victoria's face seizing up in pain.

"But what?" he insists she finishes, gripping harder on her wrist. "Finish what you were going to say, Victoria. If you don't love me, then you shouldn't have any problem admitting this."

Her eyes are a glassy cerulean, and when she speaks, it is as if there are a thousand mournful souls speaking with her. "We can be allies in the arena, Hero, best friends if you want, like we were meant to be. If we somehow end up making it to the final two together-"

"I'd sacrifice myself for you," Hero says, interrupting her. "That's been my plan for the beginning. If we couldn't both escape, I'd-"

She holds a hand up. "Please let me finish," and he goes silent. Speaking in the silence is every word he'd wish to utter, any word to make her stop and listen, to stop and realize the negative effects of her actions. "If we made it to the final two together, Hero, I wouldn't hesitate to kill you. I want to go home. You wouldn't need to have made a sacrifice," she drops her hand from his, biting her lip. "I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..." she places a hand to her mouth, running away as fast as she can from her district partner, crying the whole way.

Hero punches the counter as hard as he can, and now he is standing, looking at himself in the bathroom mirror, it cracked in several places where glass shards meet his fist. Victoria more than likely is hearing all of this noise, yet she still doesn't come to save him from himself.

His knuckles are bloody, but Hero doesn't care. Every time he exhales, it is with a fiery rage behind it.

Let Victoria Armstrong play her little games. He'll stay in the Careers, he'll stay by her side the entire time, he'll make sure they're in the final two.

However, when it comes time, he won't give Victoria the chance to save herself. He'll put a sword right through her heart.

Romeo and Juliet were a tragic pair of lovers, weren't they?

So is the pair of Hero and Victoria.

Difference is? It ended in the other causing the real bloodshed.

* * *

 ** _Carrion Bastion: District 4 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

His hands encircle around the skinny part of the bottle, he bringing it to his lips. The taste of fire and whiskey burn his throat together as the murky amber liquid slides down at a fast speed. _Shit._ He really needs to start drinking. Carrion knows that he'll probably die from alcoholic poisoning sometime soon when he's alone, if he somehow manages to make it out of the arena alive, and not like one of the bodies stuck in those grotesque crates, skin all ghoulish after having the blood drained out of the body. Carrion vows that will not be him.

He takes another swig of whiskey, stealing it from his mentor's bedroom, he out taking a piss somewhere on the sidewalk on the Capitol streets. To the roof Carrion goes, to stare at the natural splendor that the Capitol has to offer. Up here, he can hear everything that is said. He can hear everything all these loathsome Capitol citizens say to each other, jeering and laughing, laughing like crazy animals and Carrion feels trapped, trapped in this world he doesn't want to be in. He loves partying, it is why he is so drunk on the morning of the reaping, and how he gets himself into this crazy mess, laughing and volunteering like the dumbass idiot he is.

Carrion knows that there are parts of him that need to be smoothed out, rough edges that stick out like spikes along his skin, poisonous to the touch, burning to the eyes... and yet he wants to always hug himself, to wrap his arms around his body and cry to sleep at the world he's brought himself into. This lifestyle, hearing the way the Capitol citizens jeer and joke and laugh and party all the time... he wants to run as far as away as he can, as fast as he can from this lifestyle... he no longer wants to have any part of it.

The Career is preparing to do whatever it takes to get out of the arena, after all he doesn't want to die, but once he's escaped, he is not returning unless forced to. He isn't going to willingly put himself put in a situation that requires him to be like these heathens again.

The last drop of the amber liquid vanishes behind colorful and rosy lips, and yet Carrion isn't drunk. There isn't much in the bottle, it is nothing as bad as the liquor he cannot hold in on reaping day. He's spent the last hour and a half looking out at the sky, and Maisey hasn't bothered to come and check on him, as he knows she knows where he is, she off in her own fantasyland about this grand adventure she's about to undertake into the arena. He thinks she's crazy, absolutely batshit insane.

He's spent too much time up here; he needs his sleep. Carrion is about to get up when...

"I didn't expect anyone else to be up here," an all too familiar voice breaks the silence, the subdued silence, and all that is speaking in the silence of Carrion's quiet soul is his heartbeat.

Carrion turns to face Milor Drusus of District 2, his fellow Career standing somewhat shyly up by the door, dressed all adorably in his suit. "Yeah, I uh... I needed to get away from Maisey's yapping."

He half expects Milor to go sit somewhere else, as there is plenty of room on the roof for anyone to take their leisure time to relax; in fact, there might be enough room for all of the tributes to fit on this cinder block of a roof, but of course, no one is going to force them all to sit with each other, that's just unheard of. However, he swallows a bit heavier than anticipated when Milor plops himself down right next to Carrion, their hands only mere inches from touching each other. He tries not to notice it, scooting away a bit into the side of the column.

Milor shivers. Despite it being the middle of August, in the heat of the summer, it is a bit frigid up atop on the roof, thirteen stories of furnished livings, and beneath it, a stage of wonderful and beauty plastic dummies. "It's cold..."

Not for Carrion however, now sitting with half a bottle of whiskey in his belly. "And to who do I owe the honor?" he says, trying to slur his words, but unfortunately they come out a bit more hearted than he wishes to. Milor bites down on his lip in the dark, his eyes illuminating whatever little corner. A strangeness sits between the two of them, Carrion unmoving, Milor unmoving, but a certain tension settles over the top of the peculiar feel, one so thick it could be cut with a blade. Carrion clears his throat, setting the bottle of whiskey aside. "Y'know, when I mentioned talking about your sexuality on stage tonight, I didn't actually mean it."

"I know..." Milor exhales, bringing his knees to his chest. "I felt like doing it anyways, though," he looks off to the side, locking his jaw. "I was sick and tired of feeling unlike myself. I just needed to go out and say it. I'll deal with the repercussions later, whatever they may be."

Carrion is unable to imagine being in Milor's skin. Back home in Four, he is comfortable and out to pretty much everyone about his bisexuality. All of his family and friends know, and he's even told Maisey on their first night in the apartment together, when he's ticked about upstaged by District 7 in the tribute parade, an anger that is so foolishly thrown about. No one criticizes him. He's never been beat for his liking of guys and girls, or sent to some school to be straightened out. He's sure that if he decided to change to men exclusively, no one would even bat an eye. What about District 2 makes it so much different?

"Well," Carrion says, "I think that was the bravest thing I've ever seen." Milor looks straight at Carrion after he says that, taken aback, a gaze that is impossibly soft. He's pretty sure, Carrion that is, that it is not the first time someone's said it to him; Persephone probably said something along the same lines. He means it, however. That he is clearly in a world unlike his own that punishes even the slightest perturbance. "I didn't even mention my own on stage tonight, and you went out there and said it. I- I respect you for that," there's a raspy tone to Carrion's voice.

Milor nods. "Thank you, Carrion."

"What do you think is happening back home right now? With your father?"

His fellow Career shrugs his shoulders. "I don't know. I imagine my father will be talking to some people and giving answers for what I said," he turns his hand into a fist. "After awhile, I didn't even care about winning the Hunger Games because of the glory or fame it'd bring me, or what it'd bring to District 2," Milor looks at Carrion, the latter jolting in surprise as his gaze cuts through marble and bone alike, electricity taking ahold of the Career from Four. "I want to win the Games so I can murder my father. To give him hell for all he's put me through. As a victor, I'd be untouchable... I'd be above the law."

"And if you don't win?" Carrion asks, his voice impossibly quiet.

Milor gives a slight chuckle. "I hadn't thought about that... if I die," a hint of sadness pokes through the next statement. "I just hope my father gets the end he deserves, then, if that's the case."

Carrion cannot believe he is sitting next to him. He remembers what he said to Maisey back on the night of the chariot rides, they discussing the rest of the Career pack, and now with the youth of District 10 thrown into it, there's an interesting group brought together. Now, when he looks at Milor, all that is replaced is a head over the heels sort of attraction... how this guy can be _so_ beautiful yet be so deadly at the same time... an Adonis, a viper. He shakes his head, looking back at the horizon.

"Listen to them," he says. "Listen to how happy they are. Doesn't that make you sick?" It is starting to cause his stomach to churn. Carrion bites down on his tongue. "I thought I wanted this life when I signed up for the Academy, to become a victor and constantly party with the Capitol all day and night long..." he scratches his arm innocuously. "Now? I don't want a part of it. I can't handle my liquor like I thought I used to be able to," Carrion gives a hearty laugh. "I was drunk on the morning of the reaping, if you couldn't tell. Absolutely _shitfaced._ I volunteered because I had no idea what I was doing."

Milor's eyes are a precious teal, Carrion notes. They're actually brown, but it might be the whiskey doing it to him instead. "Are you drunk now?" Carrion lifts the empty bottle of whiskey. "Any left at all for me?"

Carrion grins back. "No, I don't think so. I'm just buzzed, though."

The Career from District 2 nods his head, biting on the inside of his lip. "Back home, back in Two, there's this guy," Carrion's heart freezes for a moment. "His name is Frankie, and he's my best friend," Milor shakes his hair. "He's straight, though, but he's been by my side for the longest time, always helping me with my dad, and the only one who wouldn't judge me for my proclivities," his voice gets highly nostalgic at the next bit. "One day, a few days before the reaping, he kissed me. We made out for probably an hour, and I thought it was him trying to tell me he loved me..." Milor sniffles. "It was just him being kind to me. He saw that I was in pain and wanted to help," he looks up at the sky, closing his eyes. "I was so stupid to think it was anything other than..."

"Frankie isn't here, but I am," Carrion says, before he's unable to stop himself.

He does not know what comes over him, but because he is Carrion Bastion and no one tells him how to act, or behave, or what to do, what to say... none of it, he leans in to Milor. The other Career looks at him, a bit of uncertainty in his eyes, but then their lips connect, Carrion pushing up on Milor and pressing him into the opposite stone column. Both of them mold into the kiss, the stench of whiskey lingering between them. To Carrion, Milor's lips taste like sweet moments of victory, peals of thunder locked in with his tongue, a sudden burst of euphoria before close lidded eyes.

When the two break apart after about ten seconds, in to which Carrion feels like its been a millennia, Milor is looking at him with a fragility that is otherworldly. "Was that you or the alcohol?" he asks timidly.

Carrion shakes his head, nearly bursting out into tears. "That was me, Milor, the full me..."

Everything else mends away in Carrion's mind. One moment he knows he lifts Milor easily up in his arms, despite both men easily being around the same weight, stepping into the elevator. They go back to District 4's floor, it unbelievably late, but neither one of them care. When Milor removes his shirt, discarding it onto the floor, and then his pants following after it, Carrion forgets how to breathe. When he's on top of Milor, looking down at his pale, taut muscle shining with the glean of sweat, voices warping together in ecstasy. Carrion latches onto a pulse in the neck, Milor arching up off of the bed. When he makes contact down below, in and out with their breaths matching in synchronization, Carrion sees the gilded gates of heaven for a moment.

When the entirety of the Career pack the following morning, victors and tributes alike, barge into Carrion's locked room, they find both men curled up into one another, Milor in on the inside, Carrion's arms wrapped around the other Career. Their clothes are discarded onto the floor, and the sheets as well, both men nakedly exposed to the elements... and speaking in the silence, riding on the waves of the air...

The expensive mix of whiskey and love.

* * *

 ** _Peri Florence: District 7 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

Every breath she takes is painful now. Every time her chest expands, flares of agony line the edges of her vision, followed by a hiss which is coupled with more pain, and tendrils of hell wrap themselves around her skin, latching her to the ground. She and Linden are lying together on his bed, their heads touching at opposite ends. All they're doing is talking, that is all, and yet every single waking moment of Peri's existence is now spent in pain.

She is unable to hold in the grimaces on stage, and she is beyond surprised and taken aback when Linden reveals her pretty obvious secret to the world. However, instead of being filled with rage, there's a sense of relief in her veins. Everyone will pity her, and she'll hate it, but there's nothing she can do about it now except hope than when she goes, whether it be her heart giving out from the cancer, or due to a tribute's blade... it is painless. She's suffered enough.

"Peri?" Linden's voice breaks the silence, where speaking in it is her pain, as she clenches the bedspread, trying to not think about it. His voice is so whimsical sounding, and she's amazed by him now, all the power in his tiny body.

"Yeah, Linden?" Peri holds back a few of the voice cracks, but a few still persist and she is sounding like a broken Marionette doll now, unable to be pieced back together again.

"I'm terrified…" her district partner says. "I'm terrified of tomorrow," he licks his lips. "I'm terrified of losing you."

She sits up as best she can, looking back at him, though this movement exerts more straining of her muscles than what it should. "You shouldn't have to worry about me anymore Linden. I'll be able to take care of myself in the arena, I think. We're going to be allies, remember? We're going to be right by each other's side the entire time."

He sits up, looking at her, his hair messy, his eyes brimmed with an unreadable emotion, his lip quivering. There are tears spilling down his cheeks, tears she didn't hear him utter, tiny gasps she didn't pick up, an emotion she didn't feel him pouring out. "Are you going to die in there? From... from your can- cancer?" he stutters.

Peri has been coming to terms with it. She's ready for whatever comes next, whatever her fate might be. She's been prepared for a long time now, with the bald head and the scourging of her likability. She nods. "I'm dying, Linden. When I do go, just try and take care of yourself. Try and win..." she presses a hand up against his face. She's really come to like this little bugger, love him maybe, but she can't ever see herself beyond that... especially if she's going to be a corpse in a few days. "And when you become victor of this amazing Quarter Quell, you'll have me to think about."

Linden nods, but doesn't say anything. Peri opens her mouth, to say goodnight, when there's a knock that comes from the door to his room. They both look at the door in confusion. Who'd be knocking to get their attention at this hour? It's nearly one in the morning now. Their victors are asleep, the Avoxes know not to disturb them... so who would it be?

She looks back at her district partner, he wiping at his face of all the snot and tears and emotional excess. Peri gets to the floor, being a bit slow to reach the door, fire burning through her skin, ripping her fiber of her being apart, but she has to stay strong for Linden's sake.

When she opens the door, her heart nearly gives out, and it wouldn't have been cancer that would've killed her. It would've been shock.

"Mr. President!" Peri exclaims.

Bowing his head, nearing the top of the doorframe, is President Calhoun Rodney himself, dressed finely in a black suit and tie, behind him the victors from District 7 and the army of Avoxes. Peri's mouth dries up, Linden hopping off the bed in pure stupefaction. Peri is not expecting the damn president of Panem to be the person she opens the door for. Immediately her mind goes to punishment. She's got cancer, Calhoun does not need this sort of stain, having a tribute die entirely defenseless in the arena... so he's here to take her out.

Linden must be on the same wavelength in thought, he brandishing his arms into fists in front of her, pushing Peri further back into the room, he actually snarling at the president.

Calhoun raises his eyebrows, his expression lightening. "Oh, you must think I'm here to punish you," he shakes his head. "I am not here to do that. Peri," he directs his gaze to her, and she jumps, put practically on the spot. "I'd like you and Linden to come with me."

"What for?" Peri raises her head, trying to appear as confident and intimidating as a dying sixteen year-old from cancer can look.

"Something good, I promise," Calhoun says. "I want to help you."

Not the pity again.

Speaking in the silence of his proposition, however, which Peri notes, is hope.

She could use a bit of hope.

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, let me just be the first to say that this chapter has absolutely wrecked me. I've been writing it since around 9:10 or so, and now at 12:48 I am finishing it, three and a half hours later I have cried four times while writing this, once with Galiant and Marina, then Hero and Victoria, Milor and Carrion, and lastly here with Linden and Peri's conversation at the end. God, you guys, I really love all the characters you've created, I seriously don't know how I am going to do writing this bloodbath tomorrow, but that's what I as an author sign up for with an SYOT. Just... thank you.**

 **That was Chapter #22: Speaking in the Silence, and I think this has been most definitely the highest emotional peak of this story so far, but now we've got to trudge through the Games. The Quell twist is going to have its first iteration, its first bit of interference soon, shortly after the bloodbath, so I'll say it as a fair warning to make sure you're involved. I hope you guys were brought along this same journey over the last few chapters as I've had, because good god I am so happy and sad to be writing this.**

 **Next chapter is going to be Chapter #23: Prey Versus Prey, and that sounds quite ominous, no? That's because it is the Cornucopia Bloodbath, guys. It's here. I hope you guys do review, and if you haven't reviewed at all, or not all too much, I really hope you do, just so I know I am doing something right, but I have never gotten this far in an SYOT, and dare I say it is because this cast of characters has caused it. May you all have an amazing day! I love you guys so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	23. Prey Versus Prey (Bloodbath)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #23: Prey Versus Prey. This is it ladies and gentlemen... this is the beginning of the Hunger Games, the start of our cornucopia bloodbath, and I cannot believe we're here already under such short notice, I almost want to die haha. I will tell you right now that I handle bloodbaths a bit differently in my SYOTS, as you'll see soon enough, and then the ending sections of the story are always way too long with these sort of things, but there's a lot to go over and cover.**

 **How this chapter is going to break down is that there is the countdown, and then the physical bloodbaths. For the actual bloodbath - and I seldom do this - please listen to a song called Berlin by the Piano Guys, and starting from the first physical point of view listen to the chunk at 2:00-3:45, and I just repeated that part of the song on play over and over again while writing the six pov's of the bloodbath. I think it'll enhance the reading if you do this, so try and do it as a suggestion.**

 **So, do please enjoy Chapter #23: Prey Versus Prey, and do pray it isn't** ** _your_** **tribute on the chopping block.**

* * *

 _60_

There is a rumbling deep down in the Earth, an almost guttural bellow that emits from a dark cave. Rising into place simultaneously are twenty-four individual plates holding twenty-four scared, frightened, perhaps even excited, tributes. Some of them shield their eyes from the bright bursts of light that they are revealed to, whilst others stay stock still on the plate, only breathing. Everything is holding onto the tension of a knife, as there is a countdown beginning to happen in the center of the Cornucopia, a golden and beautiful ovation in the middle of the center of the circle. Across Panem, across the entire country, everyone is watching, everyone staring straight up at the screens presented around them. It is time for the 100th Hunger Games, the 4th Quarter Quell, to begin.

 _55_

Marcus Pharadane is ready. Valencia's fresh words still echo in his mind, followed by the bitterness in his mouth at the disappointment of his training score. Tied to be the third or fourth highest Career. What a joke. He should've been much, _much_ higher, but there isn't anything to do now about it. He can sit on his pedestal and whine, whine, _whine_ and whine, but it won't get him anywhere close to where he wants to go. He gives a look around the arena, and his breath gets clogged in his throat. What are these gigantic structures doing around him? He has no better way to describe it than pieces of twisted steel jangled in some sort of path, where the pieces drop and turn into pretzel shapes, or rolls across a causeway...

No matter, whatever arena he is in, whatever type of situation he's in, he can do this. He's a Career. As the countdown commences, Marcus closes his eyes. He is not going to let his district down, and most importantly, he is not going to let his brother down.

 _45_

Milor Drusus can still feel Carrion's warm hands wrapped around his body, pulling pieces of flesh taut and then uncoiling it like wires spilling electricity out onto the sidewalk. The anger that all the victors feel from waking them up, amidst the fact that they're both naked, it is all causing a warmness to fill the Career's heart. He has never felt more truly alive than last night, rutting up against the male from Four, kissing him passionately, taking what Frankie could not give, what he'd never understand. It is almost ironic, he thinks about it poetically. Here, in the Capitol, in the arena, where every force around him causes those in it to change who they are, to become something they're not... he's gotten to express himself freely, he's gotten to stay the person that Milor wants to become. Even if he dies today, in this arena, or sometime next week, he is content with that, as at least in Carrion's arms, Milor got to become a phoenix rising from the ashes.

His hands start to tense, he eyeing everyone around him. Play time and the feeling of niceties running under his skin is over. It is time to become the Career he's been training to become.

 _40_

When Rochelle Pascal immediately sees the area around her, one word flashes in her mind. _Roller coasters._ That is what all these enormous, strikingly beautiful steel structures are poking out and around them, she able to see five on the immediate horizon. However, this could mean she is anywhere in Panem, remembering looking at historical books that described man made machines of fun, terror and more all encompassed by gravity. Beyond this, though, Rochelle knows nothing else about them. She looks down at her feet, careful to not step off to early and be blown to smithereens, surprised at what she sees.

The pedestals themselves aren't resting on grass. They're on concrete, around them are all these shops and floral and beauty... her mind working a thousand miles a minute. A plaza?

Even against all of this, there's only regret lacing her thoughts now. Whenever she looks at Deacon, that is all she feels... regret. That she didn't say how impressive, how truly impressive she thinks he really is, and now how he's going to die without ever knowing it. Does she have a chance to tell him before the end?

 _35_

Maisey Rovneay is bouncing up and down on her heels at this point. Her grand adventure is about to culminate into something beautiful. Whenever she looks around at the other tributes, there's a mixture of fear, tension, concentration and other emotions on their faces. Not for her. Pure, and complete excitement. Life is flowing through her veins now, a build up of energy that cannot be explained. All of this lying inside her body, and she prepares herself to begin vaulting forward. She knows what everyone thinks. Maisey is somehow the weakest Career, right?

Let them all think that.

Dead wrong. She links it back to her interview with Pollux. She manages to break a girl's arm simply by pushing her out of the way whilst running to the stage. How hard and how fast do you think she'll be able to slice someone's throat to ribbons with that same energy? Let the rest of the tributes think she's the weakest Career, let them think that. And let them run in terror when she chases after them with a bloodstained blade.

 _20_

Blood is everywhere in her mind. The last dying scream - she's not so sure if it's Belle or Lina that dies last with a knife stuck between their ribcage - echoes around, Annabellina Circuit's skull hurting whenever she moves. The girl from District 5 looks down at her arms, feeling a sudden power she doesn't know is there before surge through her. Abe is now in charge, he's in the driving seat, and Annabellina isn't going to take crap from anyone anymore. Who cares if her district partner is afraid of her, and what she is? Who cares? All that matters now is that she gets to the victorship.

The change of the guard happens in her sleep, Annabellina's mind trapped in a nightmare of fire, fury, and screams. Abe is roaring around obscenities, chasing around the other personalities. It is poor ole Anna that dies first, a ripple of shock causing the girl to wake up in a scream, hair matted down with sweat, yet no one runs to save her. No one comes to her aid. A stabbing feel enters her hip, and that is how Abe kills Elli. Lina and Belle do not last long after.

Annabellina crouches down on her pedestal, closing her eyes, then opening them. "It's Abe's time now..." she hisses.

 _15_

The arena is indeed beautiful, Corvus Raynott realizes, taking a moment to step back and appreciate its beauty. However, he does not dwell too much longer on the strange metallic structures built around him, they're irrelevant right now. What is the major concern is what lies in front of him, the cornucopia, and the tributes surrounding him. Corvus takes a good look around, swallowing heavily when he realizes that it is Milor to his left, and Alexandra to his right... he's not sure he wants to cross paths with either one of them in the foreseeable future. He's unable to see Lowelle, and that brings a temporary rouse of panic to his usually calm self.

He's been trying to convince her all night, the two sleeping together in an entirely platonic way on top of the bed comforter, too lazy to pull down the covers and sheets, to grab a weapon. For some reason, despite how smart Lowelle is, she has been having this strong disconnect between taking a weapon and utilizing it with the skills and facts she's brought up. He can only shake his head so many times. There isn't nothing he can do to fix it right now... he just hopes when there is a Career staring her down for a backpack, she has the decency to know to run the other way.

 _10_

Linden Hazel knows this for a fact. He doesn't need to protect Peri anymore, she's perfectly fine now. He waits patiently outside the hospital room when the door to the operating room opens back up and out steps his district partner and the president. Nothing seems to have changed about Peri, from what he can see. Her bones still are thinner than his patience, skin sags down some, her hair is still primarily gone... yet she holds herself differently.

Calhoun calls it a strength serum. She isn't cured of her cancer, but it is no longer holding her down where she's unable to even run five feet from her pedestal to an axe. Apparently, and Linden figures this out pretty much immediately, is that he has to now account that Peri isn't simply going to die. As much as he has enjoyed her company, he wants to go home. When he wins, he no longer is going to be living on the streets; he won't be homeless. He'll have a house in the Victors Village, and there he'll be able to have a family of his own choosing. Unfortunately, a thought that occurs to him as he sheds a single tear, Peri is not going to be a part of this future. He is simply going to be thinking of her as a distant memory when he slams the axe into the back of her head, sobbing while he does it.

 _5_

He has no idea whether to cry or laugh like a man wrapped up in insanity. When Galiant Rushmohone wakes up to go into the arena, eyes misty from the crying, his nose still a bright red, and his throat on fire, there's the escort waiting for him with tears in her eyes, and he his heart races at the thought of something happening to Marina. Except... it isn't Marina that's hurt. It's his mother. She's dead, died to overdrinking and breaking her neck in the tub of her house, and when he receives the news, Galiant's first instinct isn't to begin tearing up. He wants to clap and do a dance on her grave. His abuser is gone. His abuser is no more. He no longer has to worry about her should he make it home.

Galiant's legs feel like jelly standing on the pedestal. He swallows nervously, looking to his left and right. It is the girl from Two, Persephone, and the boy from Eleven, Caiden, to his sides, and that does nothing to fill his heart with hope. Wherever Marina is, he unable to see her on the other side of the Cornucopia, which certainly isn't see through, he prays that she has better luck in her terms of opposition than he does. That's all he has now, closing his eyes and hoping for a chance, praying for one to take hold. If he wants to go home, that means Marina can't, and despite her asking him to promise he'll fight his way out, he doesn't include the clause left in there by no accident.

To make it home... he has to get through her.

 _4_

Marissa Herdier eyes the countdown with a steely gaze, swallowing. Archery is out of the picture, she comes to terms with it down below, saying goodbye to her stylist before stepping into the hollow tube. Too many of the tributes - technically only three, but still too many - have picked it, and more than likely it is going to go to Marcus from District 1 before she is even able to intercede and grab a bow. Part of her is sad that the luxuriousness of the Capitol has already begun to wear off. No longer does she see the gilded and stainless steel city to be something beautiful, but instead a plague that ravishes the Earth, scorching it every second they get. Should she come out of the arena alive, as anything can happen, everything is unpredictable in this game of lying and charades.

If she closes her eyes, she's still able to picture it. She's still able to picture home, although it feels like it is so much farther away than she wants it to be. There's a sensuality around the memory, as if Marissa can reach out and touch it, but if she does, all that runs through her fingers is the silence and cold of a desolate world. Billows of dust clouds and moments of fog are all she'll feel, all she'll be able to grasp onto. If she wants to see that hillside again, in person, physically, Marissa Herdier is going to do a lot better than complaining about the circumstances she's been given.

She prepares herself to begin to run, an eye on the countdown as it goes from _five_ to _four..._ and just in three seconds the world will end in a shattering, deafening clamor of flesh and steel.

 _3_

A pit of remorse has been building in Victoria Armstrong's stomach all morning. She is unable to even look at Hero without being run over by some terrible force of guilt, all the while her mother's voice recants in her head. _You're making it home. Not him. You're going to have to be the one to kill your district partner. Yes, your district partner, the one who loves you. The one who has opened his heart out on his sleeve; you're going to have to kill him. Are you up for it?_ She knows she's up for it. She's always been up for it, ever since she hears his voice devastatingly ring around the district's main square, as Hero jogs up to the stage, saving some kid's life and dooming his own.

She wonders, if only for a brief moment what it would've been like had Milor walked in on them kissing instead of what actually happens. Would her heart change how she feels? Victoria isn't trying to come across as cold, that she doesn't value Hero's friendship, the brother and sister connection they've had, yet this is all he feels now. There's nothing left to feel except bitterness and remorse, a salty sea spray that washes over her and turns her skin to ash. Victoria straightens her form, the echoing of the countdown reverberating around the entire arena. The worst is behind her now. All she has to do is look forward at the cornucopia, look forward at the scythe she is going to snag, and make sure Hero tastes its cold metal bite at some point in this arena.

There's a home she needs to get to, and she'll do anything to get there.

 _2_

Surviving the Hunger Games and winning, not dying... it is indeed a high priority on Alexandra Quinn's list. However, her first is to keep everyone, even the tributes she'd have considered to be her worst enemies, to keep them away from Caiden, to keep them away from her district partner. When she wakes up to get ready, there's a tightness around her stomach, Alexandra's hands immediately going to try and coax some relief out of the tenseness. She races to her bathroom mirror, turning on the light, starting to pick up her breathing rate, heart rate firing off. There's nothing erroneous that she sees, it must be nerves.

There's been no other signs from Caiden's alleged poisoning. She knows she might've missed the opportunity to have Caiden eat crow, but Alexandra knows there are going to be plenty of opportunities in the arena to take the bull by the horns and give him a what-for... something as eloquent as a blade entering his back. She also knows exactly where her vote, should she survive the bloodbath after all, is going towards. Her district partner isn't going to stand a chance against the vote, no way in hell.

Alexandra is going to guarantee that.

 _1_

Colt Sheppard clenches and unclenches his hand. After Alexandra departs from their floor, and he wishes Gaia goodbye, all he does is stand in the living room of the apartment, hands clenched around the shower rod that holds the curtain up, ripping it out of the wall - he sheepishly apologizes to the few Avoxes that give him dirty looks, but there's no way he'd be allowed down in the training center so late - and bringing it with him. Colt makes his stance in the living room, grabbing his pillow and resting it on the couch. All he does, for at least an hour, is try and swing the shower rod down onto the pillow, and every time he hits it, Colt makes sure to utter a grunt as if he is really swinging his sword.

Soon, over time, the pillow begins to mold into one of the plastic dummies down below, that spills blood and guts and makes pained expressions as he begins to wail on it. After further hits, where Colt's arms are starting to get tired, and the shower rod is digging into the pillow, feathers ripping everywhere, morphs the face of a tribute. Unnamed, there is no name to it, but by the time he is finished, he pictures someone dead in the center of the living room, and he's brought them down without having a president's wife or other political official scream at him to take a hit.

He's discovered the little morsel of strength lying inside his body, even if only brief.

 _0_

Somewhere and everywhere all at once the countdown finishes, Pollux's voice bursts out of some static speakers, and a gong rings out throughout the valley.

The Games have begun.

* * *

 ** _Carrion Bastion: District 4 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

His feet meet gravel, slightly catching him off guard as he is really expecting there to be grass instead, momentarily losing his balance. Carrion sighs in frustration, already feeling a burning rage fill through his bones. He momentarily freezes to stomp at the ground, to bash his knuckles in, but he stops. Time is being wasted, tributes are running everywhere, swords are being drawn, and here he is standing stock still in the middle of the bloodbath wasting time, an open target.

He looks up, eyes spotting a backpack nestled right up against the crook of the Cornucopia's entrance to the inside of the horn. As far as he's aware, no one else is trying to grab for it, and Carrion takes off at a run towards it. His ears block out the sounds, but his eyes are unable to not see the sights. While Carrion runs, Valencia and Maisey have reached the inner circle first, the former grabbing a sword, the latter a bundle of knives, before expanding outwards.

Carrion's fingers ensnare around one of the straps of the bag when another hand manages to latch onto the other side. A croak of surprise catches in his throat, he furrowing his eyebrows at the audacity. If it is another Career, that isn't a problem. However, if not... When he looks up, the other person who had grabbed the other strap flinches, he staring into the eyes of District 3's Deacon Fincher, one of the thirteen year-olds. One of the easy ones, huh?

Deacon drops the bag, and instead bowls straight into him. Carrion loses his breath in a moment of shock. The kid is surprisingly built for his age, even though he is certain that this twerp scored terribly in the training scores. Since he is not falling back onto a soft layer of grass, spots appear in Carrion's vision when his skull collides with the concrete, quite hard. Deacon raises a fist, the boy punching him straight across the jaw, quite a slugger, Carrion feeling a wave of pain wash over his face. Deacon lands another punch across the Career's face, and this is starting to hurt. Carrion knows he isn't as trained in combat as the other Careers, like the male that would've been in the arena in his place, but it doesn't matter now. Here he is, stuck in the thick of it all.

He growls, opening his eyes in fury. No Career dies first in the Cornucopia bloodbath, and he certainly isn't about to die due to some little thirteen year-old geek from a district nobody cares about. Carrion brings his other hand to grab Deacon's other fist, the kid letting out a choke of surprise, not expecting that at all. The Career is about to twist the boy's wrist and break it, but Deacon somehow manages to slip free out of that, kicking outwards with his feet against Carrion's chest, pushing him back onto the concrete, while the kid from Three somersaults backwards into a neat flip.

Ah... he's the flexible one. _Not so fast..._

Carrion manages to kick his left foot up in the air, catching Deacon in the chest, that bringing the boy down hard onto his stomach. Recovering aptly, Carrion gets back to his feet, Deacon coughing, coughing, and _coughing,_ the air taken out of his lungs. When the two lock eyes, Carrion's veins burning with rage, Deacon's widen in fear. The boy begins to scramble back on both hands, shaking his head back and forth, muttering something incessant, but it doesn't matter. If Deacon drops the bag and ran, Carrion is willing to spare his life. Now? Not a chance.

The Career steps forward, stomping one foot on the boy's chest, Deacon arching his back in pain, Carrion's other foot standing on one of the kid's legs so he couldn't run. Deacon seems to try and sit up, as if he is going to push the Career off of him, still having the use of his hands, but that isn't about to happen on his watch.

It is almost pitiful, the bit of remorse Carrion feels twinge in his chest, when he locks his hands around the boy's head. Deacon mutters something unintelligible, perhaps a plea of survival, but Carrion has lost his extended period of grace. There is no more time to ask for pleas of forgiveness... did the kid forget who he's dealing with?

Euphoria flows through his veins, the same kind as kissing Milor, when Carrion twists his hands, and Deacon's neck breaks like a twig in his grasp, a resounding _SNAP_ following the motion, the boy from Three collapsing back onto the gravel, unmoving, his chest not even rising and falling with the motion of breaths. Carrion stands up straight over the corpse, kicking him over, bowing his head for a moment. The kick isn't meant to be disrespectful; he bows his head in respect for the fact the kid is dead, most likely the first victim. Carrion bites on the inside of his lip, looking down at Deacon's body, and then he picks the bag up that he saw from the get go, running into the cornucopia.

Around him, carnage ensues.

* * *

 ** _Lowelle Sable: District 6 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

She ducks under a misfired arrow from Marcus, before moving around and getting stuck behind a stone pillar in the courtyard, the Career over by one of the collections of backpacks, bow loaded with a full quiver on his back. Lowelle is trying to block the noises she's hearing. It is starting to become an overwhelming sound, an overwhelming distaste. So much screaming, the clamor of blades and spears and fist fights. She is trying to keep herself together, trying to not panic, as every single waking thought of hers is now consumed with the fact she is ankle deep in shit, about to die. Lowelle is supposed to be the confident one, right?

Every word that Corvus told her last night, amid trying to stick to picking up a knife and actually using it, it seems like that has all gone out the window with this one. Another arrow goes whizzing by her when she dares peek around the corner, and Lowelle swears she can see the sun glinting off of the tip of the arrow which flies past her and embeds in the corner of a wall. Footsteps approach, and she loses whatever breath she's been holding onto.

It must be Marcus coming to shoot her dead, Lowelle realizes, anticipating it, and so she vaults around the other side, taking a run for it. It is indeed the Career from District 1, he choking out in surprise, but he doesn't fumble for another arrow. He simply stands there, stunned in fact, wondering what could go wrong. Lowelle looks back at him for a split second, smiling for a brief moment... she didn't die! Corvus is going to be so proud of her, isn't he?

Speaking of her district partner, she finds him halfway across the Cornucopia, wrestling with someone up against the sheen face of the metal. _Colt._ The District 12 male is holding Corvus back, the burlier of the two reaching for a sword that is above her district partner's neck. Her heartbeat begins to accelerate, both guys straining and grasping for the blade. Colt has his arm digging into Corvus's neck, Corvus clearly struggling. However, it seems that Colt looses his foot hold on the side of the Cornucopia, the male spiraling down to the concrete and loosing his breath. Lowelle watches as her district partner rips free the sword from its hatch, and stands over Colt triumphant.

The guy from District 12 holds his hands up in surrender; Lowelle isn't quite so sure Colt would've even injured Corvus past the point of grabbing the sword. She is about to scream his name, to tell Corvus to stop, as he's going too far - going too far? In the Hunger Games? Is there even such a thing? - when Lowelle's voice catches in her throat. She doesn't even need to. Marissa Herdier, the girl from Nine, is off to the side, clutching a few rocks in her hand, and she lobs one at Corvus. It hits him square in the side, and he hisses, dropping to one knee, the attack coming out of nowhere.

Lowelle is about to take off running again, perhaps diving in front of a boulder being thrown his way, but nothing gets her there in time. Colt gets to his feet, picks up Corvus's sword which he is barely even holding onto, and runs off, leaving her district partner alone. Corvus places both hands on the concrete, hanging his head low, having lost his weapon without even getting to use it. She watches as Marissa and Colt begin to run away from the Cornucopia, but then both of them stop at the very precipice, at the very edge, pausing and looking back. They must be waiting on someone else.

She needs to go over to Corvus as quick as she can, and doing a look around her, the coast is clear. Lowelle begins running towards her ally, where all she can think about is how warm his touch is, how strong he seems to be, and how she pales in comparison, where only her mind can get them out of the situation. What Lowelle doesn't see is Annabellina running perpendicular to her straight towards the mouth of the Cornucopia, both girls colliding into each other and falling to the ground.

The girl from Six hisses to herself, clutching her head. That hurt a lot more than she expects. Annabellina groans as well, the two of them getting to her feet. Lowelle has liked Annabellina, she likes the girl from District 5 with her unpredictability, but also the fact she seems immensely carefree, and certainly non-lethal. She expects that the girl is alone in the arena, and Lowelle is always ready to have another hand.

The two stand there, still, on the concrete while the bloodbath rages around them. Lowelle gives a bereft smile, brief, perhaps a bit too hollow, but she's got the second to address it. Corvus is slowly getting to his feet, weaponless, but at least he's alive. Annabellina rights herself straight, and that means it is time for Lowelle Sable to work her magic.

"Annabellina," she starts, "Why don't you and I join Corvus? We could be in an alliance together! We could be friends," Lowelle has no idea why she is talking like that.

"Abe doesn't need friends!" Annabellina shouts at her, the temper not expected, and Lowelle jumps. "Abe only needs enemies to kill!"

Then, as if things are revolving in slow motion, does Lowelle see the blade appear in Annabellina's hand, the girl having hidden it behind her back. Before Lowelle is able to move back and out of the way - she's dodged Marcus fire arrows after all, how hard can sidestepping this be? - when Annabellina, or _Abe,_ is at her very presence. She sees the knife enter her stomach before she can register the pain.

Lowelle gasps, before unleashing a scream, as Annabellina drives the knife deeper and deeper into her stomach, blood spilling out everywhere, visceral bits of her body feeling clumsy and loose. She reaches a hand up, trying to grapple onto the girl from Five's shoulder, anything to ask her to remove the blade, but all she gets is Annabellina's glare down at her, and with one last push, the knife goes all the way in up to the hilt in her stomach, before being released in a sickening slurp noise.

Blinding whiteness covers Lowelle's vision, the girl falling back, Annabellina's entire left arm coated from fingers to elbow in a putrid scarlet, the wound she caused spilling offal out everywhere.

With Lowelle's last breath, she sees Corvus leap to his feet, his face twisted in anguish, as he collides into his ally's murderer.

Lowelle looks back up at the sky, sighing, and one lone tear falls down her cheek.

* * *

 ** _Gaia Whisp: District 12 Female P.O.V (13)_**

* * *

All poor Gaia can do is stand there on her pedestal, looking out at all the horror presented in front of her. She watches as her district partner fights with the boy from Six over a sword, or when Carrion snaps Deacon's neck, and she screams when, very up close and personal, Annabellina drives a blade into Lowelle's stomach, going further and further until the damage is done. No matter where she looks, she sees lethality, she sees pain, she sees _death._ Everyone is dying, everyone is fighting each other, and there's nothing she can do.

Her resolve is trying to build up inside of her, Gaia wants to get off of her spot and race over to Colt, to race over and join him, but she's all the way on the other side of the plaza where he and Marissa, now joined by Rochelle, are waiting for her. She needs to get a weapon, she knows this. Colt now has Corvus's sword, and Marissa is armed to the teeth with rocks taken from under one of the trees, but Rochelle is defenseless, and currently, so is Gaia.

She scans around, trying to not upheaval her breakfast when she gaze goes past Lowelle's dead body. Corvus and Annabellina are fighting, he parrying a few moves with his arms, but then she - Annabellina - drives the knife between his fingers on his left hand, and Gaia observes with a near horror to her viewing as Corvus's ring finger is sliced open. He growls, hissing, pushing the girl back, and she goes tumbling over a crate and a bench, sprawling down to the other side. When Annabellina lifts her head, Gaia notices that she's staring at someone a bit down the plaza fight.

Her district partner, Edwin, if Gaia remembers right, is frozen stuck, looking at her, and when Annabellina gets to her feet, she anticipates both of them to run towards each other, but that is not the case. Edwin turns on his heel and runs away, Annabellina quick in the pursuit. It looks like, though, with her gone, the coast is clear again, and Gaia has a straight shot to make it all the way over to Colt, weapon or no weapon.

A tiny knapsack, no bigger than her head, is lying on the outskirts by an empty tree, probably where Marissa gets her rocks, and Gaia curls her hands into fists. She's going to get out of the arena after all, so she might as well start somewhere. She leaps off of her pedestal, no longer having to worry about Lewlyn, the Head Gamemaker, blowing her sky high. Her feet connect to gravel, the world bouncing in waves under her shoes as she runs, taking off.

If she keeps her eyes on Colt and the others, it means she's going to make it. If she takes her eyes off of them for one second, it means she won't make it. Gaia Whisp isn't dying today, after all. However, it looks like Colt is mouthing something to her, but above all the screaming and all the noise, she is unable to hear anything. It is too late when she collides straight into the same bench Corvus vaults Annabellina over, her body turning at an unfriendly angle, and something down below at her feet twists and goes _SNAP._

Gaia lets out a pained cry, she collapsing over the stone bench she trips over, the rest of her body coming with it. Gaia hisses to herself, trying not to cry, as she pulls forward and the rest of her body gives way. Something snaps... but she doesn't know what it is, and when she looks over at her right foot, it is mangled and twisted in a way that most definitely means it is broken. Flares of red agony light up the edges of her vision, she twisting to her back, trying to scoot over on her hands towards him, towards Colt, towards the people who'll protect her, the people who'll save her. It's just back behind her, the rendezvous point, she has to tell herself, broken foot or not, it is just behind _her._

A shadow falls over her, Gaia too afraid to look up. It has to be Colt, though, coming to save her. It must be. He promises to be there for her, alongside Marissa, Rochelle, and Alexandra. So how come she isn't being lifted up in his powerful arms and whisked to safety?

Gaia bites the bullet, looking up, and her bones freeze solid, her blood turning to acid. Staring back at her, with blonde hair blowing in the breeze, is Maisey Rovneay, the girl holding a spiked club in one hand, and several daggers at her waist. The Career gives the other tribute a near look of pity, and are those _tears_ in Maisey's eyes? The girl from District 12 swallows, the pain in her foot evaporating, everything all at once evaporating, and there's nothing that remains besides her and Maisey, at this point.

She can see her brother waving to her in the distance, dressed all in white, his own throat slit open in a ruby red smile from ear to ear, which is how he dies in the 99th year. He's smiling, and then her parents join in, and there are tears in Gaia's eyes. She's made it home, she won and she's back in District 12 now, isn't she? This day cannot be any better.

In an action that is far more painful than what her body can handle, Gaia is now sitting with her feet and legs together in front of her, almost as if she is meditating, gaze directed forward, and there is no district partner coming to save her.

"Go ahead," she invites Maisey to swing the club, to separate her head from her shoulders, to end it all. "Do it." There's a grittiness reflected in her voice.

She closes her eyes. She will not cry for the cameras. She will not cry for the Capitol to watch another District 12 tribute fall to the shackles of the Games, and she is certainly not going to let the district mourn their loss; they aren't missing much in the end. She's happy, she's more than happy that she is to be reuniting with her family.

Maisey seems to tilt her head in confusion, but she doesn't say anything.

Gaia has a smile on her face when she dies, a few of the spikes embedding into the side of her throat.

"Mom... Dad… James..." she whispers out loud with one last breath before the blood makes things to hard to have sound break through. "Your baby's coming home..."

Scarlet pools around her, and the world goes dark.

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

It is starting to get frustrating for Valencia that she has all of this time wasted at the bloodbath, a weapon still not in her hands at this point. She hasn't even gotten a sword yet, and that is starting to get on her nerves. No one is going to take down the head honcho of the Career pack while she is defenseless, that most certainly is not happening. Valencia races immediately off of her pedestal, being one of the first ones with Maisey to reach the gorgeous pile of goodies.

When she steps into the cornucopia, Maisey having gone around the back for something that she isn't sure about, Valencia stands by herself for a good twenty seconds actually, staring at the weapons outlined on the wall. There's a dirk and a gladius in the corner that seems to have promise, or a scythe, but they're all too small for her. She has the ability to pick up a weapon, no matter the size, and use it, but a part of her wants to move beyond that. There's always one singular sword, or one set of knives, or one _anything_ weapon related that will stand out above the rest, and it isn't in here. It isn't in the cornucopia.

Frustrated, she stomps her foot, turning to run back outside when she nearly collides straight into Marcus. Valencia stops dead in her tracks. He already has a bow and arrow, the quiver loaded and the bow at his hands. Nothing is stopping him from shooting her dead, as she didn't pick up a weapon, and she isn't that strong to where she could just snap his neck with ease. Her mouth goes dry for a second, a perilous second, but all Marcus does is nod at her, brushing past his fellow district partner and further into the depths of the horn.

She doesn't feel bad for breathing a sigh of relief anymore. He is going to uphold the standards she set him last night, while they're staring out at the stars and the Capitol horizon. He's got three days to join them, three days to make peace with the fact he cannot do it alone, that he'll need _them,_ he'll need the Careers if he wants to stay alive. No one knows about the pact between he and her, she hasn't gotten a chance to delegate it yet. She's certain, however, that the rest of the group, Victoria and Hero included, aren't going to target him on principle alone anymore... he's still part of the Career pack, and he deserves to go father, beyond the others.

Valencia races out of the Cornucopia, ducking underneath Milor who is locked in a sword fight with Caiden, but there's a strange way that Milor seems to be holding back, not exactly doing any visceral damage to the male from Eleven, more like keeping him at bay. She knows that there's a heart of gold to her fellow Career, but there's going to be a point sooner than later he is going to have to make his mind up and start removing limbs from bodies.

The Career from District 1 stands just a bit off from the rest of the other assembled tributes, three dead when she looks over, but unable to see which bodies are of the deceased. She looks about, and then her eyes seize it, the golden compass, the gilded piece she's been dying to have. Dangling from a rooftop, attached to a weather vane of one of the accompanying buildings on the side, is a sword, much larger than the others in the Cornucopia, and not a single other soul has noticed it, nor noticed her looking for it. It is almost as if every other tribute is afraid to come close to the Career who scores the highest.

She makes a break for the side of the building, there being a ladder to climb up the side - the Gamemakers know that none of the tributes can amble up something like a cat or a monkey; they're humans, not primates - but then the rest of the way, a good twenty feet or so, is standing on the shingled roof, and a drop of about twenty, maybe thirty feet. If she is to fall onto grass, that's a different story... but this is concrete, and that means a broken wrist, or leg, or a knee fracture or something. Valencia gulps. This will be fun, absolutely fun.

Valencia places one hand around the first rung, starting to climb, climb, _climb._ She hesitates a few times, trying to test the sturdiness of the ladder, and it is nothing too promising where she feels like she's all of a sudden in safe hands. No one is going to be firing any weapons at her. Valencia casts out another quick gaze at everyone else. Hero and Victoria are around a humongous crate of food - good that they are smart enough to go for the food - barring of an advance of Caiden, Blake, Corvus, and a few other tributes, but it looks like it is an every man for themselves sort of deal.

Her hands encircle around the next rung, now about twenty feet up, almost to the top, when something snags onto her shoe, almost pulling her down and off the ladder. She yelps, fingers barely holding on. She looks behind her to the scowling, almost snarling face of District 8's Galiant Rushmohone. He latches higher, this time onto her leg. If she falls from this height, it's game over, and no Career is going to survive with a broken leg or wrist, especially if it is her sword hand. She tries to climb higher, but Galiant pulls down harder and she is dangling only by her right hand now, muscles straining at the effort.

She grunts in surprise, waiting to see if any of the other Careers are going to help her, but there's no aid coming. She's all on her own. Using her right foot, she lowers himself somewhat, which, having her left leg grappled onto by Galiant's hands, causes him to have to buck some. Valencia slams her right foot into Galiant's face, breaking the nose cleanly, a resonating crunch following it by a spray of copper. He howls, the hand on her left leg letting go, he holding with his right hand like her too. Valencia holds onto the ladder rung correctly once more, slamming her boot into his face again.

Galiant's grip lets go, blood cascading everywhere, and she doesn't look back when he hits the ground, his cry of pain and terror immediately silenced. Valencia makes the rest of the climb, and at the top, a good thirty-five feet or so above the concrete, she then takes a glance to see if Galiant is following her again. A bit of bile rises in her throat at the sight, he staring up at her, but he's unmoving, his eyes wide and glassy, limbs bent at an awkward angle, he falling directly onto a spire of a gate circling a garden next to the building, the spike protruding from his chest, blood caking his uniform. He did not land where she is hoping he lands... the kid isn't her biggest enemy in the arena and now...

She swallows heavily. It wasn't her intent on killing him... but there's nothing she can do about it now.

Valencia looks back at the sword, mentally prepping herself to make the leap onto the roof to grab it.

It is time that her Career training came into play.

* * *

 ** _Caiden Grove: District 11 Male P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

He barely manages to jump back before Hero's silver blade slices outwards in arc, and due to where he's standing just moments before, that means he'd be losing his lunch and his entrails. Corvus has long abandoned the fight, nursing his injured fingers which seep scarlet. It's just them and the Careers at this point, but it seems like the other Careers are too involved with looking over the other dead bodies or taking weapons to physically come over and do anything.

Victoria hisses at him, brandishing her own axe, he taking a sword, but he knows a losing fight when he sees one and backs off, Blake seemingly having the same idea in mind. The District 9 male stops for a second in between, Hero and Victoria going over to the crate they've been defending, wrenching it open. It is almost a lost cause now, for Caiden to remain here, but there's still one thing he could do. He's looking for Alexandra, as he knows that at least two of the other girls are now dead, Lowelle due to a knife in the stomach, and Gaia from having her head lobbed off by a brutal club.

Caiden wants Alexandra to see fear first hand, not just through touching a poisoned apple. Around his neck is his token, a large and bulbous heart made of glass, and inside it, the emerald toxic liquids, the poisons he's made so secretively, but to the untrained eye, at a distance, due to the coloring of the heart necklace, it looks like water. The Gamemakers are not going to remove a tiny vial of water that can be drunk in a matter of seconds. Or so he wants everyone to believe.

He's got a sword, which surprises him as he anticipates he'll have to make a tree branch turned spear or something like that instead. Caiden stops, standing on a stone bench, one that causes him to blanche at the thought of Gaia's twisted foot, her body somewhere... and then, _aha,_ there she is. Alexandra is crawling around, on the ground, uninjured, trying to go around Carrion who is guarding a bag or two, rummaging through it, his back stupidly turned away from anyone else who could potentially come up from behind and kill him.

The male from Eleven smirks. This is going to be too easy. He takes a running start, jumping over several benches, before he is atop Alexandra. He thinks about not saying anything, simply taunting her and smirking before bringing the blade down, but there's always a method to his madness. He isn't here to kill anyone, at least... not yet. He brought his vials into the arena for a reason after all.

Caiden does it anyways, thrusting his sword down, Alexandra only a few feet away from him, and they only ten yards or so from Carrion, the Career so caught up in something that he doesn't do anything, nor take notice. His district partner unleashes a guttural scream when the blade lands right next to her, almost cutting off her braid which is lopsided to her left shoulder. Alexandra turns around, her eyes widening up at Caiden.

He knows she hates him; it's written all over her face. However, once again, it is a power play, and he is holding all the power. Alexandra swallows, trying to steel her gaze.

"Do it," she taunts him. "Kill me."

"Unwise choice of words, Alex," Caiden plays this game easily and fairly too. "I'm gonna give you a fifteen second head start." He rights himself, playing quite dangerously as a Career could just easily, but he doesn't care. Tormenting her has become too much fun. "One... two..."

Alexandra's eyes widen in terror when she realizes he's being serious. She gets to her feet, running away, over to some sector of the arena, towards what looks like the front of all of the rollercoasters, if Caiden is to assume anything true about the layout of the arena. He entertains, only for a second, the thought of chasing after her, but she's faster and he knows it, but she doesn't know it. What Alexandra Quinn doesn't know won't hurt her.

He goes to take his own route of escape, as it is starting to seem like the Careers are getting things situated when someone runs into him, but the force is nearly negligible. Caiden reels back just a bit, dropping his sword, and something else clatters as well. A tiny, almost undisputable knife, but one that could still do some lethality. Its owner? Marina Penweather. How did this little girl get a blade? In fact, how did she become so well-stocked during a bloodbath? The thirteen year-old immediately begins to back up, racing the way she had come from, perhaps trying to get out of the way of the other foes as the Cornucopia is starting to become a ghost town.

Caiden picks up the knife she drops, she starting to run away, but not nearly as fast as Alexandra, she clogged down with bag upon bag on her body. Easy target.

He is using the poison for Alexandra, when the time is right.

He can use this blade and the sword whenever he wants.

Tucking the short knife into his chest, and then outwards with the flick of his wrist, he throws it directly at Marina. It stabs herself right in between her shoulder blades, nicking part of her spine, and the girl goes down for the count, letting out such a pitiful shriek, her arms flailing wide, her items she's collected spilling out onto the concrete. When he walks over to her, having picked up the sword she caused him to drop, he makes a _tsk_ noise at her.

"You should've taken the knife. I'm sorry," he says, deeply regretting that he has to do this. "I would've let you have it. Now..." Caiden has bile build in his throat. He doesn't want to kill her, he shouldn't kill her, but there's only one victor. He promises, even without saying it aloud, he'll make her death as painless as possible. "It is part of your undoing."

Raising his sword high, like he did with Alexandra, he thrusts down. Only this time, he doesn't miss Marina's back like he would've intended with taunting Alexandra.

When he removes the blade, her body having gone limp, he going down through the heart, the stainless steel is stained with the crimson droplets of her blood.

Caiden Grove is not happy about it.

* * *

 ** _Marcus Pharadane: District 1 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

He's got his eye on one last tribute to shoot at, the boy from District 7, he rummaging through a backpack on the outskirts of the cornucopia, an axe by his side, but he's so consumed by the fact of digging through to find supplies, he's totally unaware of what could be around him. Marcus loads an arrow into his bow. He's been missing on purpose, missing intentionally. He's armed to the teeth with supplies though, because all he is doing is scaring tributes away from the items they're collecting, taking them for his own.

Marcus loads the arrow, drawing the bowstring. He'll miss on purpose, scare little Linden Hazel, and the items in the bag are all his. He doesn't get to fire however, as out of the corner of his eye, someone barrels down the causeway towards him. Marcus barely has time to switch directions when the foe hits him, with a lot of strength that he is not expecting, the air in his lungs flying out with one large gasp of breath. When he gets his bearings, the misfired arrow going who knows where in the arena, he's gripping the bow to hold up the force of Peri Florence.

Wait? _Peri Florence?_ His mind is surging red alerts. She's the weak one, the weak tribute who looks emaciated and frail and- how is she? Peri is the girl who takes minutes to walk up to Pollux, the tribute who got a _four_ in training, and all of a sudden- Marcus no longer has the time to try and hold it all together; he exerts every ounce of his being into trying to keep himself alive.

"You do not get to touch Linden," she hisses, a blade at her belt.

"I thought you were the weak one!" he chokes out, his throat bulging at the fact that the bow is now digging quite painfully into his Adam's apple.

"So did I," Peri has a glow in her eyes, one that is certainly not there before. She grabs the blade at her belt, a gladius about the size of Marcus's wrist to elbow. Raising it high, Marcus winces, waiting for the blow. She slices the gladius down, but Marcus is quicker than she anticipates. She's fighting a Career after all. His training, despite not being the best at shooting first, asking questions later, means there's more form to him than hers, by far. "Someone gave me some help!" However, Peri does not elaborate on this mysterious 'someone', striking first instead.

His bow catches the blade, which is a surprise to both of them, he croaking out a bit deeper than her as there's a sudden surge of strength from her down slash, the bow digging into his skin. It is the strange sensation of the cold metal and the trapped heat of his flesh which oddly enough gives Marcus a surge of power. Pushing back on her, Peris face twisted in concentration, he forces her off of him, her blade and his bow flying out of their hands.

Marcus throws Peri off of him, he getting to his feet and twisting away from her. His bow is behind him, the quiver still on his back, and he picks it up. By the time he loads another arrow, she's scrambled away from him, picking back up her gladius and she takes off in Linden's direction, both now at the outskirts of the cornucopia. Marcus lowers his shot.

He's not that good to where he'll be making a shot from a good fifty or so yards away; that's just crazy.

There's nothing else to do, expect run off and-

A terrified yell that sounds all too familiar to Marcus's ears cause him to stop, he whirling around. What he sees makes his mouth dry up. Standing over by one of the sides of the Cornucopia is his district partner, Valencia, she in a sword fight with Blake Hanley of District 9. Marcus raises an eyebrow, bow still loaded, quiver full. She looks like she's struggling against him, Blake's veins all the way from Marcus's point bulging out of his neck.

He swipes down, she parries. Blake growls deep down in his throat, kicking Valencia in the chest. She slams against the cornucopia, the wind getting knocked out of her, and she is barely able to block the next vicious swing he directs towards her. Marcus steps forward, his heart hammering in his chest. Valencia is the strongest tribute he knows... there's no way she isn't going to win this.

His heart sinks when Blake manages to disarm her, Valencia's precious sword sailing in the air and landing in the dirt way too far for her to go and reach. It looks like her cries have gotten the attention of the rest of the Career pack, all six of them - Milor, Persephone, Hero, Victoria, Maisey, and Carrion - but they're way too far away, they're over on the other side milling through the supplies as Marcus foolishly thinks that the rest of the tributes are gone, but he forgets about Blake.

She's going to die if he doesn't do anything.

He- he doesn't want to kill. Marcus Pharadane wasn't to kill; it's too early. He didn't kill Rochelle, he didn't kill Linden, he didn't kill Peri... is he really going to kill someone to save Valencia? The right thing is to let her _die!_

"Oh shit," he says to himself, bouncing up and down. Maisey is fast, but she isn't going to reach Valencia in time to make a difference. His district partner will be dead and all of Panem is going to see Marcus not even lift a finger. Blake is going to stab his district partner in the gut. "Oh shit, oh shit ohshitohshitohshitohshit..." he curses to himself. There's no time like the present to make a hasty decision. "Oh shit!" Marcus swears, and then closing his eyes, he opens them after a second decision. " _Fuck it..._ " he thinks to himself.

Marcus draws back the bowstring and fires, only keeping his eyes open as long as he can, Blake heaving the sword in the air, about to swing it down. He doesn't want to see the aftermath, that he can protect himself from.

The arrow lands primely in the back of Blake's skull, scarlet spewing everywhere.

* * *

 **24th: Deacon Fincher, 13, District 3 Male. Killed by Carrion Bastion of District 4. Created by Alecxias. Man, oh Deacon, oh Deacon, how your story has been cut short. You were the last tribute to join and were the very first one I knew I was going to kill. As soon as everyone starts to like you and pity you, I have to end you short. Something about your inner struggle, how you were the personification of a clear boy just going through life, it killed me to have you go. Let's hope Rochelle fights for your honor.**

 **23rd: Lowelle Sable, 17, District 6 Female. Killed by Annabellina Circuit of District 5. Created by LordShiro. Ah, Lowelle... I will say, you were definitely difficult to write, but along with it came the fun of analyzing your inner monologue, and I know you and Corvus would be doing and having amazing adventures with each other right about now. Your death is probably unexpected, but something's gotta give... and I need to amp up the shock factor. Corvus most definitely will have your back in the arena.**

 **22nd: Gaia Whisp, 13, District 12 Female. Killed by Maisey Rovneay of District 4. Created by DefoNotAFanGirl. Gaia, where do I begin? Your innocence and your tragic backstory mixed together makes for an amazing tribute, but like most of District 12, the odds are just too highly stacked together. I cried writing the little bit of you and your brother, but do not fret everyone; she's with her family now, and doesn't have to face the terror of the arena. Colt is going to be ticked, you know it.**

 **21st: Galiant Rushmohone, 15, District 8 Male. Killed by Valencia Shale of District 1. Created by Tiger outsider. This was the one death I didn't want to write. It seems like everyone, despite there being a bit of dislike for you, my boy Galiant, people were all touched by your character. However, every bloodbath has a character that dies and everyone is upset, a good contender... so sorry to say that you were the one to be the fall guy for this; beyond dying at bloodbath, I think you could've gone far.**

 **20th: Marina Penweather, 13, District 8 Female. Killed by Caiden Grove. Created by ilvidis. I didn't want to do this one either, but the odds, like Gaia's, were simply stacked against you my poor statistician. You balanced out Galiant well, and I am going to miss writing your precious thoughts. It is a disheartening fact to know that District 8 has been wiped out so early, but maybe had you reached out to Colt's alliance, your fate would've been better. Keep counting numbers in heaven, sweetheart.**

 **19th: Blake Hanley, 18, District 9 Male. Killed by Marcus Pharadane. Created by glittergirl20. Five bucks you all thought I was going to kill Peri then and there, and you guys were going to riot. Blake, Blake, Blake... you were a misunderstood individual with pent up anger that only, in your final moments, did you have the ability to reveal. I think, though, you've catapulted Marcus's character development, and you even showed you weren't to be messed with as you disarmed Valencia in your fight. Had Marcus not have been there, you would've killed Valencia, and probably fought off Maisey for enough time to recover. Perhaps Marissa will take the District 9 victor crown and bring glory home instead, now.**

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Marcus Pharadane** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ] / **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Persephone Castor** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

District 3: **Rochelle Pascal** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by santiago poncini20_ ] / **Maisey Rovneay** [ _Submitted by_ _Tiger outsider_ ]

District 5: **Edwin Bishop** [ _Submitted by IciclePower33_ ] / **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 6: **Corvus Raynott** [ _Submitted by LKiraApple_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon]_ / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 9: **Marissa Herdier** [ _Submitted by_ _Reader Castellan_ ]

District 10: **Hero Slade** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ] / **Victoria Armstrong** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ] / **Alexandra Quinn** [ _Submitted by SparrowBirdEliza_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen... that was the cornucopia bloodbath. Six tributes gone, and now we're down to a cast of eighteen. If you're a submitter who has a tribute alive, congratulations... now just buckle your seat belt for the long haul. We've said goodbye to Deacon, Lowelle, Gaia, Galiant, Marina, and Blake... and I'll say right now it was unintentional to kill all the thirteen year-olds, oops... it just occurred to me writing down their obituaries. District 8 is wiped out, and it looks like 3, 6, 9, and 12 (all multiples of three and four... huh) are hanging on by a thread. I also do need to say this, as I feel like it is important... Peri was not faking her leukemia, she was actually sick with it. (Just for clarification)**

 **So, did any of you guys take up the offer of listening to the song, Berlin by the Piano Guys at the specific sections I outlined? Repeating that part over and over when the fighting starts, due to the melancholic tone and the intensity of the instruments, I think it was a perfect background. If you didn't read the bloodbath with the song added over to it while you read, I suggest you try it out!**

 **This was Chapter #23: Prey Versus Prey, the cornucopia bloodbath. What I am going to say next is going to be very important, and I will be reminding you about it for the next two chapters after as well. Chapter 26 is going to be the first tribute vote-off. If you are a submitter of one of the 18 tributes left alive, I am going to need your help, as the twist involves you. Between new and the posting of Chapter 26 (which I am aiming to be either Sunday, February 10th or Sunday, February 17th), you are going to have to PM me, or even in the forum say, who you are voting off. If you have multiple tributes still alive, it does mean you vote twice. I am not going to tell you how to vote, or that you are not allowed, if you're in an alliance to get together and discuss... I will not be interfering with this vote in any way shape or form. However, if you do not vote by the deadline for the allotted amount of times you may have, I will be using RNG with a specific set of characters I think your character / or characters would vote for. If you do vote on time and have multiple tributes, specify who that tribute is particularly voting for.**

 **Do know, however, that the votes of which tribute voted for which tribute will be outlined in that Chapter, #26, so it isn't like it is going to be anonymous, unfortunately.**

 **That being said, ladies and gents, I hope you all somehow enjoyed Chapter #23: Prey Versus Prey, the bloodbath of Sheep Led to Slaughter, my first SYOT to ever reach this point, and ya'll, I am over the moon. Please review, you guys, as this is one of the main motivations for me to continue, as I have written probably forty to fifty thousand words in the last two and half weeks and I don't want my inspiration to run out, so get those reviews in! I hope you all brought tissues for the chapter, and once again, who thought I was killing Peri? Raise of hands? Whatever the outcome may be, get those votes in, and I will see you back with another Capitol character focused chapter, #24: Rocking the Apple Cart. I love you all so much. Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	24. Rocking the Apple Cart (Capitol Plot IV)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #24: Rocking the Apple Cart. We're back to the Capitol character storyline, and there is going to be some upheaval of emotions ladies and gents; I hope you guys are psyched! Last chapter was #23: Prey Versus Prey, and my very first Cornucopia Bloodbath I have ever gotten to write... and oh it was so devastating, having to kill tributes; my heart hasn't recovered and it is only probably going to get worse from here on out. Next chapter is important, as well as #26, but that'll be referenced for the ending AN. Hope you enjoy Chapter #24: Rocking the Apple Cart.**

* * *

 ** _Bonnie Rodney: Head Designer of Mutts P.O.V_**

* * *

A somber tone settles over the Gamemaker Center once Lewlyn prepares the cannons to be fired signifying the deaths of the tributes in which the bloodbath stole their lives away. A few of the kills surprise her - Bonnie - but she isn't to say that she's disappointed. No one that died were true contenders, not in her mind. The only noise so far is the static of the cameras, observing soundlessly the viewings on screen, the viewings of the arena. Bonnie bites down on her lip, watching as the male from District 1, Marcus, collides in a hug with his district partner, Valencia, the two resting their heads up to each other. She understands why, she's pretty certain, the guy just saved her live.

Bonnie never quite knows how to feel after watching a tribute die, for being in the center and getting an up close and personal shot. Calhoun watches, seldom, in their mansion, he always finding something else to do instead of putting his eyes to screens and seeing teenagers die. It excites Bonnie in a strange way, something she is unable to identify and give an answer to, but when she looks at the action, at the gore, her heart beats in her chest viscerally and she wants more to happen. Six deaths at a Cornucopia bloodbath with a tribute pack as entertaining and devilish as the one presented? She has to say she is disappointed.

She's never seen, in the years that she has joined the Games Preparation Council, or the GPC - an acronym made by Calhoun to simplify the administrative processes in creating the Hunger Games arenas - Lewlyn cry or clap or cheer or get angry. It is as if there is nothing emotional that happens in the Head Gamemaker until the Final Eight, where the stakes really do matter. As a matter of fact, as Bonnie looks over at her, she's bent over a panel, getting the cannons ready to mark the six, but there's an impasse of emotion on her face.

The president's wife is trying to not look at Rennie whenever he walks by. She's surprised, when arriving in the morning, to find him already there working on last minute, _last minute_ touches. Bonnie's job is never finished, her team's job is never finished. The mutts, her children... there's always something to be improved upon. He's dressed finely in his lab coat, and there's an air of happiness around him, something that puzzles Bonnie, as she's never seen him _happy._ When she comes across Pollux in the hallway earlier, he heading to the TV station for commentary purposes, he barely even gives her a glance, rage and fury seeming to emanate from his body. It is probably in part due to the fact he is ridiculed so terribly by pretty much every tribute last night, somehow upstaged by all of them that wander up to what is supposed to be his domain. Only her husband seems to be acting normally, every other guy she knows in the Capitol administrative system working and walking out of funk.

Lewlyn whispers something to an aide, who nods, and then she claps her hands. Everyone, including Rennie, is dismissed, leaving to just her and Bonnie to talk. It is what they do, it is what they always do. The room is emptied of everyone that isn't important - Bonnie adds this herself, because let's face it, she's important - and the two ladies who steer the Games in the right direction get down to business. Bonnie and Rennie share a fleeting glance, and she notices something odd about him. While he's dressed in his white lab coat, there's always been a ring or tassel on his body in the typical red fashion of Avox clothing to signify what he is... _an Avox._ That piece of identification is nowhere to be found on his body. She narrows her eyes at him, but if Rennie notices this, there's no indicator on his face to give him away. The Center is flushed out, and now the two Alpha females remain.

The Head Gamemaker's threat still rings in Bonnie's head. The woman is likely to break her spine and crack her neck, that is unless she reaches Lewlyn first, but Bonnie's smart. She knows how to handle Lewlyn Davis; she's been doing it for years while taking Rennie out back. However, there's something different about that threat, a noticeable difference to it that just does not settle well over Bonnie's skin, and so she'll stay dormant like a lynx or cougar watching their prey. She can wait.

"So," Bonnie starts first, getting down to the ground level, turning the projector off. There won't be any action with the Games until tonight, when the first voting round happens anyway. "What did you think?"

Lewlyn makes her way to the bottom as well, resting her hands on the digital projection table that highlights the arena dome. Her brow is furrowed, her hands tapping on the metal. "Less than usual. Usually we have a mean of seven deaths..." the fact that the Head Gamemaker says it so nonchalantly sends chills down Bonnie's spine. It is so odd to her, when she puts thoughts together and forms bridges, how desensitized she is to say that it is unusual how so little tributes died. "And beyond that, it looks like not many of them wanted to kill each other..."

"Valencia didn't mean to kill Galiant, you saw the look on her face," that disappoints Bonnie, when she says it, a bitter taste filling her mouth and souring her gums. She's been keeping an eye on the female Career from District 1; getting the highest training score is no easy feat, head and shoulders above a few of her fellow teammates, and when she makes her first kill, that look of displeasure on her face sends mirroring ripples through Bonnie's bones. "And Marcus killed Blake out of desperation, otherwise Valencia would be dead..." she looks away, saddened at the prospect.

The two of them could talk about the tributes and who should've died and all of that fanciful jazz for hours and hours, but there is truly matters at hand that need to be discussed. Bonnie tries to picture what a good day with Lewlyn would feel like, if such a thing could even exist. What it would be like if they weren't at each other's throats? All she sees is a black void, meaning it doesn't exist, and meaning it couldn't ever exist. The moment Bonnie shook the other woman's hand, long before political marriages were a thing, she feels the way Lewlyn's fingers curve into talons and drag quickly down her skin, and how the smile smells of perfume and fecal matter wrapped together in a scent unlike any other.

She is certain the same can be said for her as well, on the Head Gamemaker's perspective, and she is hard pressed to agree. Living in the rat's nest that they call the Capitol, with these vipers who slither along the ballroom floor holding martinis and wearing revealing dresses to show their sagging cleavage, where every word spoken is playback or feedback from another memory long forgotten, Bonnie knows that eventually everyone starts to blend in.

There's only one way for her to get the air of her concerns out, and she might as well ask.

Lewlyn falls silent, standing over the arena projection. The entire arena is flat, it being at some theme park up north, slightly to the Midwest a bit, but Bonnie hasn't gotten to physically see it. It is one of Calhoun's suggestions, actually, to use an old tourist attraction back in Panem's bygone era, instead of having to construct something entirely fake. There is no dome this time, but an electric forcefield at the edges that drags on and on for miles. Even if the tributes reach the end of the physical land in the arena, there's a lake that sprawls outwards for miles beyond that.

No one is escaping, just as Bonnie cannot escape these damned thoughts, thoughts that'll drag her to hell.

"Lewlyn?" she asks.

The Head Gamemaker looks up, rather demurely. The thaw of the dripping blood still resonates in both of their souls, the echoes of a smashed gong or cymbal crash that ricochets through their body. "What, Bonnie?" Lewlyn sounds tired, a dredging, sort of dragged slur to her words.

Bonnie scratches at her back, tilting forward some, a wave of nausea passing over her. She's been getting hit with these waves the last couple of days, ongoing and very sudden, nearly impossible to predict. She squeezes her eyes shut, and when she speaks, her voice is raspy, giving too much emotion behind something that hardly calls for it. "Rennie," she says cryptically, causing Lewlyn to raise an eyebrow. "He was here before I was. I'm always the first person here on the morning of the Games. Did you let him come here earlier than usual?" At this, the Head Gamemaker touches her hair, and Bonnie's known her long enough for that to only mean one thing. Nervousness. "I didn't see his Avox identification either..." Something about the answer she expects terrifies her, but Bonnie doesn't know what it is that is making her feel so unsteady.

Lewlyn sighs, tilting her head back up to the ceiling. "Not even twenty four hours and you notice..."

"Notice what?" Bonnie tilts her head, hissing, a hand going to her stomach. A sharp, sudden pain shoots through her. Her cry of sudden agony does nothing to gather Lewlyn's attention, she distracted between trying to listen to her associate and stem the stabbing feeling in her lower half of her body. It passes, just like the nausea, and as if nothing happened, she's back to normal. Bonnie looks around, body shaking. _What was that?_

The Head Gamemaker frowns, and then locks eyes with the president's wife, tears in her eyes, tears Bonnie does not expect. Somewhat happy tears, Bonnie isn't sure. "I released Rennie from his contract. He is no longer an Avox."

Bonnie cannot believe what she's hearing. The woman that she's known for ten years plus, who has always had a heart of black, or so what she makes it out to be, lifted the chains off of her brother's soul. Something doesn't compute. "I- I'm sorry... _what?_ Lewlyn, you did what now?"

"Rennie is free from me," Lewlyn lifts her head. "I did a lot of soul searching and what I realized was wrong..." she shrugs. "It was the least I could do."

Somehow, for some reason, Bonnie is not going to let this slide, not a single chance. Instead, her body is filled with a soulful fire, a rage that seizes her and burns down the very core of her heart, that encasement of gold melts away to a furious and blazing black, retribution and insanity running through her veins. She gets closer to Lewlyn, her voice nearly thunderous. "You mutilated him, Lewlyn! You think simply releasing him from your care is going to help him? He can't speak out loud because of what you did! He has no home to go to, he has no job... you took away his love for music! Releasing him is not going to make amends!"

"You don't know his heart," Lewlyn flashes her a glare. "Don't presume to know what my brother feels or does not feel. I know he'll never trust me again, after what I've done, but I am in the right step of getting forgiveness."

"You don't deserve forgiveness," Bonnie spits at her, acidic in full, her heart hammering in her chest. It should've been her to grant Rennie this freedom, not the wicked witch who casts the spell on him in the first place. "You deserve the cold blade of an axe separating your skull from your shoulders. You deserve justice."

"And who is going to bring it to me?" the Head Gamemaker taunts, mocking the president's wife. "You? Your husband signed those documents allowing for Rennie to become an Avox, Bonnie. You've always known that! He has just as much of a part to play in all of this as I do, because he _accepted_ it. Why would he have done that?"

She does not have time to get curveballs thrown at her. "I am going to go tell Calhoun to fire you right now," Bonnie lifts her head, defiant, nose in the air. "Put you on house arrest, and when the Games are over, you'll die."

Bonnie goes to walk past her, but Lewlyn grips her wrist, just like she did back in the training center, the same forceful way that nearly makes the designer of the mutts stop dead in her tracks, almost ripping her arm out of her socket. When Bonnie looks back, the contemptuous glare given back to her makes her body tense up and freeze to pieces. "Don't forget I know what you've done. If I go down, you're going to go with me too. You've seen Calhoun when he's angry," Lewlyn's eyes twinkle an alluring and frightening emerald green. "His rage doesn't discriminate. Everyone falls under his guillotine. I am sure he won't save you for being a cheater."

Dark clouds shroud over her thoughts, and Bonnie rights herself, swallowing. A threat not to be taken lightly. "I am going to go back to the mansion. Do you think you can hold down the fort?"

All Lewlyn does is nod, opening her mouth to say something, but whatever that'll be, it is irrelevant and Bonnie doesn't have the time to listen to this lying bat spew even more bullshit. She takes the stairs back up to the top, back to the exit, about to walk through the sliding glass doors, when, "Bonnie," Lewlyn calls out, and the president's wife stops and looks back, hating herself while she does it; this woman, this craven slut... she shouldn't have this much power over her. "Just because Rennie is no longer my Avox doesn't mean he's yours to go and cheat on your husband with," Lewlyn raises her head. "He's still my brother and I am going to protect him from every damn demon in the dark that I can, you included. He's off limits, Bonnie. Go ruin your marriage somewhere else."

Bonnie doesn't look back, only hearing half of her sentence before vanishing out of the Gamemaker Center. Part of her never wants to return, but there's no way that'll happen. She is overcome by another wave of nausea as she goes out of view of the devilish Head Gamemaker, groaning to herself.

Something is rocking the apple cart, and she isn't exactly sure what it is.

And that terrifies her.

* * *

 ** _President of Panem Calhoun Rodney P.O.V_**

* * *

He finds her sitting down in front of the fire when he comes out of his study. Calhoun leaves one hand on the knob on the door, the other down by his side, but he doesn't say anything. She is so pretty, he thinks to himself, his wife. How beautiful she is next to the open flame, where the flickering embers and light passes over his wife's blonde hair, her lipstick lips. Calhoun is usually one to let her be, as whenever the Games come around, she's hellbent into her work on aspiring perfection, even though he knows perfection cannot be achieved.

Calhoun wants to join her, when she's in the Gamemaker Center, perhaps to be the distant figure that keeps his wife away from Lewlyn so both don't claw each others eyes out, but he does not have the heart to watch this tribute get their tongue ripped out, or watch a sword go through this one's back. Even thinking about it causes the president to shudder. Only when it comes time for the victor's interview at the end, with Pollux handsomely dressed, does he see the Games full out. It is simply him asking Bonnie for the play by play, and even those details, where there's hardly any description to it, cause his stomach to churn as if he's been stabbed in the intestines.

She isn't moving, except for the slight swaying, more than likely due to exhaustion.

He crosses his arms over his chest. "I thought you didn't like having the fireplace going," Calhoun teases her. "It's the middle of August, and last time I checked, you chastised me for having a fire going while I was reading."

Her voice is barely above a whisper, and that rings off alarms in his head, blaring sirens and cardinal lights flashing off in his head. He crouches over to her, but before Calhoun reaches Bonnie, she gets a bit closer to the fire. "I'm just... cold right now," she says.

"Honey, what's wrong?" He's only ever seen her like this once, all quiet, and even a few days ago doesn't count, as she's more concerned for his sake than her own. It is when Bonnie's mother dies to some form of cancer due to the woman drinking herself to death, and Bonnie wonders aloud where her drinking problems come from. When she looks at him, her face is streaked with tears. Something is up. His wife never cries. "Bonnie, seriously, what's wrong?"

She sniffles, wiping at her nose. How long has she even been in the apartment, he suddenly thinks to himself. Calhoun has been cooped up in his study since the start of the bloodbath and he hasn't been back out to the rest of the world since. He tosses a quick glance to the outside, and it seems to be about midday, maybe a bit after noon. An hour and a half after the bloodbath, at least. "I just... I've been thinking about the tributes. Those mutts are going to tear them apart..."

There must be more on her mind, Calhoun comes to terms with, but he's never been one to press her further on anything emotional. Something has got to give, unfortunately, and he's recognized it year after year. She's always wanted to be around the Games, but knowing her emotional attachments, he's tried to steer her off course, but Bonnie insists. Every year a bit of her heart collapses and falls apart, but nothing like this, which is why he assumes there must be something off.

"Who died today?" he whispers. Calhoun is going to watch for the vote-off, and he should just wait to see, but he wants to hear it from her. "And how?" the president adds, his own throat going hoarse, he having to turn to the side and cough. If he is any other universe, he thinks, as the leader of any other government that didn't have the Hunger Games as their form of punishment, he'd take it in a heartbeat. Here, however, he is strung up his ears and left for the population to batter at him like he is a piñata. If Calhoun touches his side, sometimes he can feel the ghostly remains of a billy club bruising his pale flesh up and down in a circle of blueberry indentions, or the globule of spit that slides down his face when some idiot decides to hock a lucky one at him.

Bonnie sits upright, Calhoun now wrapping his arms around her, he nestling his head into the crook of her neck, warm and snuggled, her blonde locks falling gently onto his face. This is how he gets her to calm down, by having her feel his heartbeat through her body, to prove they're still in sync together, to prove that even the trials and venomous, vile words that the world has to offer, nothing can sever them apart, nothing can break them. "Carrion snapped Deacon's neck. Annabellina stabbed Lowelle in the stomach. Maisey beheaded Gaia. Valencia kicked Galiant onto a gate spike. Caiden stabbed Marina through the heart. Marcus shot Blake in the back of the neck..." she shudders in his grasp.

"So... deaths?"

"Deacon, Lowelle, Gaia, Galiant, Marina, and Blake."

"And the murderers?" Calhoun has always called the tributes that word, whenever he and Bonnie have these conversations. Something about them being forced into an arena together and having to kill each other, the person who is victorious comes out alive as a murderer, no matter what they might think of themselves as beyond that. Victor, survivor, vigilante... they're murderers. Calhoun is a murderer. Bonnie is a murderer. Lewlyn is a murderer. Pollux is a murderer. Everyone is a murderer in the Capitol.

"Carrion, Annabellina, Maisey, Valencia, Caiden, and Marcus."

"And are you okay?" he asks her. It is probably torturous, making his wife go through this, but it is an instance where he almost wants to put his hands on his hips and a wag a finger at her. Nothing it stopping Bonnie, nothing is stopping his wife from stepping down and giving the job to someone else. She is never able to keep her eyes glued to the screen at the inevitability of a mutt ripping another murderer - err... _tribute's_ \- throat out.

She rocks back and forth, swallowing heavily, loud enough where he hears her. "Yeah. I'm fine."

"Do you want to take a nap? Lie down? I'm sure Lewlyn is more than willing to take over it all for you."

Bonnie shakes her head vigorously the moment the Head Gamemaker's name comes out of his mouth, and it is does not go unnoticed by Calhoun. He furrows his eyebrows in a strange lapse of confusion. It is clear to everyone who isn't blind, and even then blind people would be able to hear it, that neither lady gets along. Calhoun wishes he had a magic wand to wave around and fix whatever strife is between them, but he pauses, as it is entertaining, to watch his wife amble above Lewlyn's head and spin her around so she gets lost. Panem has not collapsed with them being at odds, despite whatever conflicts may exist and persist against the decay of time, so he'll let the deflections rest.

However, the way she acts so violently at even the mention of her name, it is a reaction he has not seen from Bonnie in a long time, perhaps just the same dose of vehemence when she discovers her mother's diagnosis. Calhoun brings his eyebrows together, but does not show a perception of understanding on his face; his wife does not need extra added stress on top of her already excessive work load.

"I'm not tired," Bonnie says.

Calhoun lowers his hand down to the hem of her dress, lifting it up, his fingers lightly traipsing over her backside. He's missed her. They haven't done this in such a long time; there is a time when he forgets what it feels like to have her warm body flushed against his, the moans colliding with the columns on the wall. He is about to start kissing her neck when she turns around and grabs his wrist stopping all immediate romantic action.

"What?" he asks, and he is upset at himself for the twang in his voice hinges a bit on annoyance. Calhoun is not supposed to ever be annoyed with his wife.

"Not right now."

He nods. Boundaries are understandable. Both of them need it though, some form of contact, to pull back the comforter and bed sheets for more than just sleeping. "Well, how about tonight? After the vote-off?"

She shakes her head again. "I don't think I want to, Calhoun. I'm sorry, I-" Bonnie pauses, biting on her lip, and she looks away, hands going to her body, latching onto pieces of clothing.

Calhoun hopes his disappointment is hid well enough, the last thing he needs to worry about is her seeing the fact that he's starved for attention. "Okay, Bonnie, whatever you want."

He is about to get back up, to help her up, as there's still a country to run, where her voice is barely heard above the crackling of the fireplace. "Calhoun..." his wife whispers.

"What, honey?"

Her response is Earth-shattering, and it definitely rocks the apple cart.

"I think I'm pregnant..."

* * *

 **Well, ta-da! That was Chapter #24: Rocking the Apple Cart, and oooh boy, I've been away from this story for like five or six days and it has been nice to get back and start typing some more, even if it is a bit of a shorter serving with this chapter. Again, we'll back with the tributes for the next chapter. So, takeaway... Bonnie might be pregnant! I haven't actually gotten to write pregnancy with a character on the journey of the story before, so this'll be exciting! Can we get some love for Bonnie x Calhoun in the reviews, yeah? Some support from a non-tribute pairing that seems to be doing okay?**

 **Remember, if you have a tribute alive in this story and you haven't cast a vote or votes yet for the first vote-off, you need to make sure you get those into me either via PM or through the forum - I mean, if you want to say it in a review, you could, but that just feels unofficial for some reason - and that will come into play for the first time in Chapter #26: Temptations By An Angel. I hope you guys do review, and let me know your arena tribute predictions, possible victors, all that good jazz!**

 **I will see you all soon with Chapter #25: Selling Their Souls, with another five tribute POV's after the recuperating from the bloodbath, which is certainly needed. I hope you all have an amazing day! I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	25. Selling Their Souls (Night 1)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #25: Selling Their Souls. This is the official halfway point of the story, as we've reached 25 chapters, and there's only 26 more left to go. I am over the moon with this, you guys. The bloodbath has made you all cry, which was it's intent, and beyond that, amazingness has started to happen with our Capitol storyline. Make sure, if you haven't gotten your vote in so far for the tribute you wish to vote off, get that in, as it will be happening next chapter! Time for Night 1 of the arena, and we're going to delve further into this nightmare. Hope you guys enjoy Chapter #25: Selling Their Souls.**

* * *

 ** _Annabellina Circuit: District 5 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

Even if he is her district partner, Annabellina doesn't care, she's going to have Abe stab him in the back, piercing bones and breaking the blade through the flesh. There is nothing better to her right now than the look of terror on Edwin's face as he runs from her, Annabellina holding the blade that she sent into Lowelle's stomach down by her side, fresh blood still dripping off of the knife.

Annabellina's mind is stuck in limbo, broken in two where Abe is screaming at everyone and everything, and whenever she looks down at her own hands, they begin shaking. She's killed someone, yet she's unable to get herself off of the broken warpath. With the tributes scattering away from the Cornucopia, there aren't that many directions for them to go, as there isn't a forest around them to run into. All that surrounds her is concrete paths, stone buildings, and these steel structures that look menacing from the ground level, painted all beautifully. However, Annabellina is not focused right now on the beauty of the arena, her focus is directed solely on the guy in front of her.

Part of her remembers kissing him, kissing Edwin last night, but the look on his face when she retracts from him sets Abe off. Annabellina tosses and turns at night, screaming and hissing and holding her stomach in pain, yet her ever caring, supposedly seeming to worry about her well-being district partner does not ride to her rescue. When Anna tries to calm Abe down, it is the straw that broke the camel's back. Annabellina wakes up in a mood she is unable to describe beyond lament terms, and looking at her bedspread, she's lying on the mattress bare, no sheets, no comforter, and she's shifted by about a foot or so and at around fifty degrees or so.

" _What did you do?_ " she whispers to herself, expecting Elli or Anna to pick up the helm and be calm like usual.

" _I've helped us tremendously..._ " Abe responds and she lets out a petrifying scream.

This is what it feels like right now, for her, knowing that these actions she's performing aren't her own, the words that she is speaking aren't hers anymore - perhaps they've never been hers - but it is a thought that frightens her beyond a place of death, an ascendance she may never recover from. Edwin rounds a corner, daring to even look back at her, and Annabellina twists her face into a snarl. He's going to die for what he's done to her heart; he's going to die for what he's going to do to her heart, and if she wants to get out of the arena alive, he's going to have to lose his life regardless.

She lifts the knife up. The surge of strength that is in her body when the metal pierces Lowelle's body is one from another world. What can Abe grant her in terms of the throwing department? Annabellina growls, chucking her knife at him, globules of crimson following the free throw path, a morbidity in the toss, and it just barely, by a hair perhaps, misses Edwin's left shoulder, he disappearing out of sight.

Annabellina comes to a stop. She doesn't have any other weapons, and Abe is stomping around in her head, cussing, breaking things, throwing things, shaking Lina's corpse around and bashing her head into a wall. He got away. Truthfully, it doesn't matter, she'll be able to find him again no problem. She picks up the knife, shivering, nearly dropping it as her mind breaks the enclosed shell of horror around it.

Truth be told, she's out of breath. Whatever Abe is able to do in physical strength has fallen to the wayside in terms of stamina and cardiovascular endurance. Her heart pounds in her chest at a million miles per hour, and she collapses up against a side of a building. There is hardly any tree coverage, no shade to stand under unless she is to duck into one of the buildings. Benches mark the sidewalks, and amidst these towering structures of steel, Annabellina feels lonely. This isn't an arena constructed by the Gamemakers in the full sense of the word. This place has been here long before Annabellina Circuit is even a thought, and all the Gamemakers have done, which can either be brilliant or lazy, she doesn't quite know yet how to decide, is plop these twenty-four unfortunate souls in.

 _"Twenty-two at least,_ " she corrects herself. Annabellina watches Deacon's neck get twisted in seconds, and the sound is nearly euphoric to her ears, and as she looks back down at her blade, bile threatens to appear in her throat. It is almost reflexive, her stabbing Corvus through his hand, slicing open one of his fingers when he tries to punch the lights out of her. The realization hits Annabellina like a wave crashing over the shore and wiping away a sand castle, and her body begins to shake again. What has Abe done? What has _she_ done?

"I killed someone..." Annabellina whispers aloud, clutching her head, blood drying on her skin, blood mixing in with her hair. The air stinks rancid of copper and mildew, and when she places her hands down on the sidewalk, the ground feels a bit sloshy, nearly wet, as if it is freshly laid cement instead, which puzzles her, as she's clearly been running full out and not getting her shoes stuck. Her mind can now only be occupied with what has just transpired at the Cornucopia. "Oh my god... Lowelle is dead because of me."

" _Good._ " A voice she never wants to hear again. A voice that is akin to her pouring sulfuric acid down the sides of her legs, ripping away tendrils of flesh that scatter like leaves to the wind. " _One less obstacle to going home."_

"I never would've done that to someone!"

" _You were a coward before me!_ " Abe roars, and Annabellina jumps out of her own self for a moment, despite the fact it is _her_ yelling it out loud, and that is most definitely a guaranteed way to get her killed if another tribute hears her screaming obscenities out into the atmosphere. " _I've made you beautiful! I've made us beautiful!"_

She wonders if she hits her head hard enough on the stone if it will crack her skull open, sending Abe to float around aimlessly without a host. A hum fills her ears, the same static breaking noise as the wire touches her skin and the world explodes in a sea of white, agony and euphoria at the same time, the smell of rotten eggs wafting in the air. It is her loud scream that breaks her father's attention, and there's even more white light as she's thrown unceremoniously onto a gurney with a hospital official on one side and her father on another.

How her father breaks down outside of the room with another gray haired doctor having a hand on his shoulder as his little baby girl will never be the same... How Annabellina recalls taking her top off in the mirror one day, her voice rising higher and higher until the name Belle appears in her mind. How her knuckles turn bloody when Abe raps them against a door handle because she loses an earring due to Belle's slutty side...

Look how far she's come, right? Annabellina cracks a weak smile, looking down at the blood stained knife. Whether she likes it or not, whether Abe forces her to or not, she is going to have to get out there and do some killing eventually; she cannot expect the rest of the tributes just to keep on eliminating each other one by one in that manner. No one is a bystander anymore.

She's sold her soul.

Annabellina cries into her hands, the rage in her veins receding, and the fresh image of Lowelle's horrified face as she dies now forever engraved in her memory. She sobs even harder at the possible thought of what her father must be feeling... to see his little darling, his Annabelle, his light brutally stab someone else. She's not his little girl anymore, and if she returns to District 5 from this arena...

She isn't going to be anyone's _anything._

* * *

 ** _Colt Sheppard: District 12 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

Gaia's scream in her last moments before Maisey lops her head clean off will forever stay with Colt no matter how long he lives. He and his newfound alliance or running, just plain running, no rhyme or reason to where they're going except to get out of the Cornucopia. Marissa is leading the pack, with Rochelle down behind him, he and Alexandra at the same speed. They've been running for probably ten minutes or so, and he already feels the need to upheaval his breakfast.

There is a consensus of disorderliness amongst the four of them, and he is technically the only one armed, he with the sword that should've been Corvus's had Annabellina not messed everything up, but Colt is grateful that he has the metal in his hands now, to defend himself when it comes time, and to cut ties when it is necessary. Marissa drops her rocks, which she never even throws, and Colt is about to chastise her when he realizes it is pointless, there are all sorts of these tree planters with rocks the size of his bicep around them; her weapons supply will never run out.

However, he isn't as focused on that as he should be right about now. A mix of emotions boils in him, ranging from sparing Corvus's life back at the bloodbath when he should've just sent the blade into his gut, and then to seeing his district partner die right in front of him. It is a wave of humiliation, sadness, shock, and regret, the latter perhaps being the largest of them all. What is everyone in District 12 thinking? He has a clear shot to go for Maisey, which would've given time for Gaia to recover, and yet all Colt can do is stand there and unleash a yell when his district partner slumps over headless. Perhaps it may have been all in vain, since Gaia broke her foot, and that Colt has no idea if Maisey is some skilled fighter or not.

" _I'd pick Gaia..."_ he recalls himself saying, to Valencia, just last night before Interviews. This is where the regret seems to start, building up slow until it overwhelms his senses. Colt puts it clear that if it is between he and Gaia, he is going to save his district partner, he remembers vividly crossing his arms and interrupting the Career, and now the swallowing he has to force himself to do sickens him to the very core. "But I do value my life..." he mouths to himself, furrowing his eyebrows together in confusion, he no longer focused on how tired he is; that's irrelevant now, in the bigger picture.

They come to a stop eventually, hiding underneath a large storefront that is south from the Cornucopia, and Colt is drenched in sweat. He wipes his brow with one hand, throwing to the ground a backpack he snagged up before taking flight. However, something hits him, when he looks up, Marissa and Rochelle quite uncomfortable as well. That's right. It isn't just him that lost a district partner. Deacon and Blake are gone as well, and selfishly, oh so selfishly Colt is only thinking of himself.

However, it is Alexandra that he gravitates towards first, she looking more perturbed than any of them, and he's seen firsthand three people die.

"Hey," he asks, she jumping at the somber tone of his voice. It has been a long time since anyone has spoken, Colt imagines. At least twelve hours, which is a long time for someone to not hear another human's voice, let alone their own. "Are you okay?"

Alexandra lowers her shoulders, running a hand through her ponytail, before nodding, swallowing as she does. "Yeah... I think I'm fine," she looks down at her hands, turning them into fists and squeezing something imaginary. Colt assumes it must be Caiden's neck. "Caiden nearly killed me back there..." and her voice rasps at this, and to Colt this is the first, albeit brief, moment of weakness from her, where before there's been the summoning of God's wrath down upon any bystanders. "He gave me fifteen seconds to run. Like he was taunting me..." Alexandra rubs her arms innocuously. "I was so scared I didn't even grab a weapon or anything," she runs her hands over her face, sighing. "I am pretty sure he didn't even chase after me. He just wanted to get to me and he did..."

"I hope you kill him," pipes up Marissa, she leaning against a column, arms crossed, more annoyed than anything else if the look on her face is anything to go by. "I haven't spoken to him yet, but he sounds like a complete asshole."

Colt goes to reply, but he's cut off short by Rochelle who stands up, not having spoken a word, who turns as if she is going to wander away from the group. He knows that'd be absolutely an inane thing to do... she's unarmed, scored a _three,_ and as far as Colt is concerned, not a fighter in any regard. "Rochelle?"

She looks back at him, and her eyes are bloodshot red, tears streaming down her cheek. A sledgehammer hits Colt in the heart. He is indeed selfish, spending all his time mourning Gaia and it is definitely clear that one of his own alliance members witnessed her district partner die, to a Career no less, just like Gaia. "I just..." her voice cracks, and so does Colt's heart. "I just need a minute..."

"Please don't wander far," he advises her. There's more that he wants to say, extra bits of advice he wants to add on, but it'd be simply rubbing salt in the wound at this point. When one is an emotional state, they are not thinking clearly. He's already suffered one alliance member loss already, he cannot stomach a second so soon. Always preventable, they'll always be preventable. Rochelle looks at him as if he's lost his mind, and he hastily bites down on his tongue to soothe the sharp retort that'll surely follow.

As Rochelle wanders off, Marissa slides herself down the column she is resting against, sitting next to a bush. She begins to pluck leaves off of it, discarding them to the side after she tears them up a bit. Alexandra moves over some so she is in the shade more, and she stays there, biting off the edges of her cuticles. Colt locks eyes with Marissa once or twice, but none of them are really up for talking. He's already heard the rumors passed around, as to what Gaia has told him this morning, when the alliance is officially announced. Here he is, picking allies in the arena who do not have practical weaponry skills, his mediocre at best, which Colt attributes himself, and they're all girls too.

Colt pictures his mother's face very clearly, his forehead touching hers in an embrace of kin, a warm fire passing between them. It has been his goal in life, in Colt's life, to respect women, to protect them, as his own, the woman that inspires him, proclaims it. A bit of this alliance is indeed that very mission, that he is saving them, but he knows it to be true. Even with Marissa's balk attitude, and Alexandra's angry fire that courses through her veins, none of these girls would last a day by themselves in the arena, and that's a hardline fact in which no one else wants to admit it. Admitting the truth hurts.

He looks back over at Marissa, and her face is riddled with disgust.

"What?" he asks, tilting his head to the side. She's been staring daggers at him for the last five minutes at least.

"I'm just thinking," she says, but it is in the normal tone that she does that gets underneath his skin the most. Marissa purses her lips, tearing another leaf in two. He watches her hands, the way her fingers twitch, the way her left arm bends downwards and how her then empty palm clenches... it almost looks like she is practicing a stabbing sort of motion. "You left Gaia to die, didn't you?"

Colt chokes on air. He sits up, and even this rouses Alexandra from her stasis of self containment, she frowning at the conjecture. "Excuse me?"

"You were right there, sword in hand, and you let Maisey behead her," Marissa tilts her head. "Does me explaining it further help?"

He crosses his arms. Colt is afraid that if he reaches for his sword, which is lying just right next to him, that'll be too threatening of an advance and everything will explode. The male from District 12 has to look over at Alexandra constantly, trying to keep her in the back of his mind as she'll become collateral if the fireworks go off too early. "Last I checked, you had a pile of stones in your arm you could've thrown. Why didn't you throw one? It would've hit Maisey far faster than me running and blocking the swipe." Saying that out loud rationalizes the fear. It rationalizes the situation.

Marissa shrugs her shoulders. "She wasn't my district partner," and that is perhaps the lowest blow she can inflict on him at this moment in time, Colt feeling that stab straight in between his eyes, on the bridge of his nose. She stands up. "Gaia wasn't my concern; she was _yours._ You vowed to protect her and when she needed you most, you weren't there for her. At least between Blake and I he knew that I severed ties because Blake didn't try reaching out to me."

Colt stands up as well, but he leaves the sword behind. "You're skating on thin ice, Marissa."

"And you're standing on thinner," she snips back. "Besides, how can Rochelle, Alexandra or I trust you now? You promised to keep Gaia safe and you couldn't even do that. What makes me think you'll protect me when it comes down to it?"

"You also aren't twelve years-old!"

"And you're eighteen; that automatically catapults you to a fighter!"

He's had it. She's spoken not even ten sentences to him and he already doesn't want to be in an alliance with her. Colt steps up to her, gritting his teeth. "That's it!" he shouts. "By tomorrow morning, I want you gone, away from Alexandra, Rochelle, and I. You're no longer in the alliance."

Marissa laughs, throwing her head back. "On what authority?"

"On mine," Colt juts his thumb back in his direction. "If you aren't away from us by dawn, I'm going to kill you."

She raises an eyebrow, and Alexandra audibly gasps. Colt licks his lips, hoping that the wavering flicker of doubt that crosses over his face isn't too noticeable, as he is actually, in all honesty, not planning on doing that, but since he's already uttered the words there is nowhere to go except forward. However, it looks as if Marissa can call the bluff, call a spade a spade. "You're going to kill me? The guy who had to have the president's wife scream at him to swing his sword at a plastic dummy? Colt, let's be honest here, you aren't killing anyone any time soon."

"Are you so sure about that?" Colt doesn't bat an eye.

"Guys," Alexandra intervenes, getting to her feet and pushing the two apart gently. Colt wants to combat the force, to stay still and not move, but he relents anyways. "Colt, I am pretty sure we're all just a bit high strung about the deaths and all," and she turns to the girl from District 9, "And Marissa, I don't think it is a good idea to provoke him. We're all allies, and if we want to have any chance at beating an eight team Career pack, we have to stick together."

Marissa shrugs her shoulders. "Colt said he wants me gone. If he wants me gone, I'll leave, don't worry about that."

"Marissa..." Alexandra complains, but it looks like there's nothing to change her mind. The District 11 girl looks back at Colt helplessly, but he shakes his head, biting down on his tongue. All of this, all of this is happening because he is unable to keep his mom's promise to protect, he is unable to do his duty to his district partner and rescue her from the devils in the dark, all because he values his own life more than Gaia's - Colt knows this to be the truth, he just doesn't want to say it - and now he's just pushed an alliance member not even an hour into the damn Games away out of spite.

He rests his head on a column, exhaling, and this time he definitely makes sure to wrap his right hand around the hilt of the sword. This weapon isn't leaving his sight.

Colt Sheppard seems to have sold his soul.

* * *

 ** _Linden Hazel: District 7 Male P.O.V (14)_**

* * *

He's been quiet the entire time ever since Peri tells him they need to leave the Cornucopia, as she assumes Marcus is hot on their trail. Linden only nods complacently, axe at his belt, a backpack slung over his shoulder, and the two race off together into the arena, ducking under tree branches and stopping at corners of shops. Linden knows that there were at least six that died, leaving eighteen out there. The Careers will be all bunched up together as a group of _eight -_ his heart picks up a bit every time that thought crosses his mind - and then there's himself and Peri as a tag-team together. Colt with his group of female tributes is another four, and doing the math, Linden is sure that leaves four tributes running by themselves in the arena: Corvus, Annabellina, Edwin, and Caiden, all of them possible threats.

However, he isn't even thinking about threats at this moment and time, projecting power and strength onto other tributes. When he looks over at his district partner, over at Peri, she's the threat now. It is freezing cold where Calhoun leads them, not saying why he's deciding to help her, not saying why he's doing anything, or where they're going. He instinctually holds her hand the entire time on this walk with the president and a practical legion of Peacekeepers at their back. There isn't anything romantic to it, although there's been muddled confusion in terms of feelings the last couple of days; he's simply looking out for her.

Linden is left outside a room all by his lonesome, which has him sitting up against a wall while he literally twiddles his thumbs, bored. Terrified scenarios come and go in his mind. Peri is being brutally beaten with clubs, or getting shot at, or something violent has to be happening to her as the president has singled her out among everyone for some unknown reason. Hours seem to tick by when the large doors that she and Calhoun stepped through open, Linden leaping to his feet, and whatever semblances of weakness he's seen in Peri over the last week are undetectable. Her shoulders are set back, head high in confidence, and she's smiling, actually _smiling._ It doesn't matter what has brought this change on; Linden is grinning from ear to ear as well.

That is, until what comes next.

As the president puts it, which still has his mind swimming in scientific confusion, Peri's been injected with some sort of strength serum. To demonstrate this, Linden watches as his district partner, from what he's seen be incapable of even throwing a knife down the targeting range, pick up a chair high above her head and vault it halfway down the hall, a feat he is sure he is unable to do as well. From how he takes it, Peri has been now elevated to a fighting chance. Without this serum, he knows despite not saying it, he'd watch her die at the Cornucopia, unable to reach a weapon time before some Career kills her, most likely. She is not cured; Peri is legitimately still sick, and still technically dying, but now there's a drive to her now.

As Calhoun puts it, which sours Linden's mood dramatically, is that the president cannot cure her, he cannot interfere in the Games in that sort of manner, and despite that, he cannot cure cancer overnight either. He elevates her fighting chance so Peri can get out of the arena and be able to afford cancer treatment. Linden wants to know where the translation is lost, however, since the president looks at him directly.

In order for Peri to be cured of her cancer, in which Linden wants this to happen, don't get him wrong, he has to willingly die or let her kill him so she can get the care she needs. He also will not lie; he's entertained the thought before, but immediately everything is squashed after last night when she admits to him that he needs to fight for his own survival. It is an unspoken problem now, between he and her, where now he can actually kill her to survive, to live. He just hopes there never comes a time.

It bothers him, honestly, that people are assuming he is just going to willingly lay down his life. He wants to go make a home back in District 7. Living on the streets has not been the most swell of times, he is sure thousands will agree, and there's a future for him when he wins, instead of just being a corpse in a box that has all of its bodily fluids drained out. He has really come to appreciate his time with Peri, but there's an uncertainty that even if she does win, and even if she does receive the cancer treatment... she might end up dying anyways.

Hell, she could die _tonight_ if the world is so cruel, but-

"Linden?" Peri interrupts his train of thought. He jolts out of his labyrinthian head space, shaking his head back and forth. "You alright?"

His throat has gone completely dry since they started running, and he doesn't really know what to say. Something has taken ahold of her, and it is Peri next to him now, but at the same time it isn't, and he's unsure if he'll be able to fall asleep at night with being worried about her stabbing him with the gladius at her belt. He has learned how to fight and scrap on the streets, with the boys bigger than him until he's spitting blood in the sewers. When he's being beaten by the boys and the gentleman in charge of the homeless shelter tells him to quit, yet Linden goes back anyways till he rises higher than them... that is where his strength arises from, staying on the streets and making his own way.

The woman's hands are claws tearing at his insides, her tongue a scaly black that slithers over his skin, and her face mirrors that of Peri and-

He shudders, squeezing his eyes shut and taking a shaky breath. His entire body feels like chipped porcelain. Peri runs over to him, hands unlatching from her sides, non-lethal, non combative. It is the person he meets on the train in front of him, fiery yet singular, wilting yet strong. Her skin is cold to the touch when she presses a hand up against his face, he looking up at her.

"What's wrong, Linden?"

Linden doesn't quite know. There's a thousand and one reasons in his head as to the problems he's been experiencing, all traumatic. He's seen people die, and he's having to entertain the notion of being the one to kill his district partner in the end if it comes down to it... could he do it? He'll _have_ to, as if he doesn't even have a choice.

He swallows, his Adam's apple coarse as a rock as it shifts in his throat. There is a reflective fear looking back at her, one that has Peri part her lips slightly, and she recedes just for a split second, but it is long enough for Linden's heart to split in two. She's afraid, just as much as he is.

"I saw people die, Peri," he whispers, looking down. Rivets of shock still run through his body when he witness Gaia lose her head, or watch Galiant fall onto a spike grating on a gate, and as he thinks of this, the bile threatens to reappear out of his throat. As he says this, Peri's eyes sadden. He knows why. She nearly killed Marcus, in turn as the Career nearly killed him - a chill runs through him at the realization that he could be dead with an arrow in his liver right about now - so his district partner is already well versed in the realm of watching people die.

"I'm sorry," Peri says, and then she turns away from him. "We need to continue moving. Find a place before it gets too dark."

Linden looks up after her, watching as she starts to run again. He doesn't want to be left behind eating her dust, and he starts jogging after her again. However, another statement goes unsaid, and he'll never utter it until it is time to cross that bridge, to set it aflame and watch it burn. " _I'm going to have to watch you die too..._ "

Above them, the sky begins to transition, and the world begins to darken.

* * *

 ** _Corvus Raynott: District 6 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

He is already missing Lowelle. Corvus finds a crook underneath one of the rides, one of these large rollercoasters, a backpack slung over his shoulder, and in his right hand, a shovel that is lying on the ground in one of the empty buildings, trying to stem the pain and the tears from flowing together. His tears have dried long ago, but the fresh feeling of agony that washes over his left hand due to Annabellina sending a knife through his hand. He looks down at the gauze wrapped tightly around his fingers. It is stained a deep crimson, almost cherry black, and the stab wound isn't even all that deep. It merely slices the right side of his middle finger on his left hand, but he feels like he's been stabbed through the heart.

His district partner is dead, and he is unable to even fend off her killer before getting injured. He's lost the sword, the sword that would've surely been able to end Annabellina's pathetic life, and now the gentle giant from District 12, who clearly isn't as gentle as he comes across if he managed to take the sword away from him, has it, surrounded by his flock of hens somewhere else in this arena. Corvus clutches his chest every once in awhile now that he's by himself, taking a moment o catch his breath. He nearly died; he could've died alongside Lowelle at the bloodbath, yet Colt spares him when there's the absolute opportune moment to end his life.

Corvus closes his eyes, resting his head back on a cushion. The room he runs into, the room he is currently hiding under looks like a station of some kind, and inside it are these vehicles attached to the track in the center. The ride is called _Gatekeeper,_ and Corvus thinks that sounds like one amazing name for something, but does it come alive is the question. The shovel is lying down near the entrance and he picks it up. It isn't a sword or a knife, something he knows he'll be able to use, but it's close enough. Inside his bag is a tarp he can sleep under, an empty canteen of water, and a flashlight. Corvus leaves the flashlight in the bag; turning it on would be a dead giveaway to his location.

With his closed eyes, he can see her clearly, Lowelle's smiling face, her dark hair curling over the side of her shoulder. Then everything shatters, scarlet splatters across the vision, and Corvus jars away from the thought. He shudders. It's been hours since the bloodbath now, the sun starting to sink beneath the sky in a rainbow of reds and blues, lights scattering along the horizon. Corvus looks down at his bandaged up hand. He should've been able to block her jab if he actually has a weapon, but then again... he knows where that went.

His mind wanders over the vote. He should vote for Annabellina after all, since she is the one who killed Lowelle, but part of him doesn't want to do that. Corvus wants to be the one to actually end the girl from District 5's life, he wants to look at her face of horror similar to Lowelle's so he can feel the joy flow through him at avenging his district partner. He'll take her own blade and use it to end her life. Fitting, right? He hopes so.

Corvus is about to close his eyes and take a slight nap, as it looks like he'll be left alone atop this building, stuck inside with the shovel next to him, but just as the veil of darkness slowly covers everything away, a loud and blaring trumpet fanfare causes him to jump out of his skin. Corvus whirls around wildly, the noise seeming to come from the sky. He rushes over to one of the edges of the station, peering out over the skyline. It is the Panem logo, the sun fully disappearing beneath the sky, and it is instead lit up by an illuminative blue halo. He looks out and sees a large body of water beyond the fence line, as if the arena they're on is an island. Corvus has a sudden desire to go swimming.

It is the anthem, he is pretty sure, where the Gamemakers display who died during the day. After he is stabbed through the hand, and unsuccessfully manages to take down one of the District 10 tributes, Corvus beats a hasty retreat, taking a backpack with him, and then the shovel, and now his current spot. The first face to shine in the sky is Deacon, at only thirteen. He didn't know the kid, but dying to a Career has to suck, and to make it even worst, he's the first to go.

However, it is no surprise to see that the Careers from One and Two are alive, as there's never been a single bloodbath when any of them have ever died. Lowelle's face briefly flickers across the projection next. She's gone, just as he is really starting to appreciate her company, just as he thinks they might actually be able to get somewhere... and now Lowelle is dead. Annabellina will pay for this, but not through his vote. She'll pay by dying at his hand.

Marina's face is next, and Corvus bites on the inside of his cheek. Another thirteen year-old with no promise to her name. Galiant follows, and he is somewhat saddened at the reminder. No one deserves to be beaten, by a parent no less. Corvus didn't see him die, but he's banking on it being a Career kill. It hits him then that District 8 is wiped out, neither one left. With Deacon, there's Rochelle to continue the fight, and he is trying to pick up the torch that Lowelle leaves behind. However, Galiant can no longer pick up the fight for Marina, nor she for him, and something about that sends ripples of shock through Corvus's body, where his limbs go numb.

He hears the cannons from a few hours ago at this point, he having counted six in total, and no others have been fired to signify any other deaths, and now with the anthem there's been four; all six have to be bloodbath related. The next face to come up is Blake, and Corvus tries to remember if he can even place the guy. He remembers the guy's interview, which is a bit more solemn than expected, and he had a great face to look at, but beyond that Corvus is unable to remember much else about him.

The last to appear is Gaia, and Corvus lowers his head. He saw her die, saw Maisey hesitate from taking the girl's skull clean off, and that means Colt is also without a district partner. As rude as it might be, as heartless as it might be, Corvus feels in part that it is bad luck on Colt's side since he took the sword, leaving Corvus defenseless, and now that means he's without his closest ally for the remainder of the games, but that's trying to link connections out of nothing.

Corvus is about to return to his first position and sleep when the Panem logo stays in the sky still, another blare of fanfare following it. He rolls his eyes peeking back over. There isn't a replaced image, but rather Lewlyn's voice, the voice of the Head Gamemaker coming out of this hole in the sky. Corvus gets cold again, he rubbing the sides of his arms complacently.

"Good evening tributes, this is Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis speaking. Starting in the next half hour, the very first tribute vote-off, one of four, will take place. Each of you will be given a piece of paper and a writing instrument," Corvus snorts at the fancy word choice; is pencil too arbitrary to use? "Within the hour after that you must write down the name of the tribute you wish to cast your vote for. You cannot look at what someone else is writing down or otherwise that'll be a vote cast for your name instead. There are eighteen of you left, all eighteen names are eligible, including your own if you wish to vote for yourself," he wonders why anyone would be stupid enough to do that. How dumb could some of these people be? "If you end up deciding not to vote, one will be thrown in for your name in its place. The tribute with the most votes will die. Who that is depends on you all. How they die will not be disclosed. That tribute death will be revealed at midnight come the end of the voting round, with a tally of the number of people who voted for which tributes," and he can almost feel the smirk on the woman's face. "Don't worry, those tallies will remain anonymous for your sake. Happy Hunger Games, and may the odds be ever in your favor!"

With another trumpet fanfare - Corvus has no idea why the Capitol loves that damn instrument so much - the holographic picture of the Panem logo and anthem disappears, Lewlyn's voice dissipating like warm constant notes over the water, which ripples in its lasting effect, and all that is left is the reflection of the moon on the azure sea, a sight that calms Corvus down.

He goes back to his cushion, resting his head back. A half hour should be a long enough time period to mull over who he wants to vote for. Annabellina, once again, all logical points seem to be pointing to her, but it is highly doubtful that the other tributes out there in this arena even want to go after someone like her, with all the personalities in her head and whatnot, to take pity on some helpless girl - as _if_ she's helpless - and that leaves Corvus out of options.

Is he willing to sell his soul for his district partner, over Lowelle's dead body?

Corvus is bothered by the fact that he might not have an answer.

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

She's been staring at him for the last fifteen minutes or so, not saying anything, but keeping an eye on him just to make sure nothing happens. Marcus is back in the group, his separation clearly not lasting long. The others are bit a wary, Milor and Carrion more than anyone else, about letting him waltz right in, but Valencia is absolutely okay with it. Her district partner saved her life, spared her life as well, and that is something she can never forget. It'll be hard to think about when she inevitably has to kill him.

They're stuck at the Cornucopia, deciding not to have gone very far branching outwards from their original destination. That is what tomorrow is going to be for, and she hopes that things don't already fall apart. Every pair seems to be broken off together, Maisey talking to Carrion about something, but their words are unintelligible. Whatever spark that is in Maisey's eyes from the countdown has been dimmed a bit, ever since she removes Gaia's head from the girl's shoulders, but that tiny aspect of craziness is still there. No one has seemed to yet acknowledge the elephant in the room about the two boys, Carrion and Milor sleeping together, clearly naked in the same room together after being unable to find them. Valencia laughs to herself about the memory, as it is rather endearing, the two falling into each other's arms. Occasionally Milor will look over at Carrion, and the latter will bite his lip, causing the other Career to blush, but nothing seems to have evolved past teasing.

Currently Milor and Persephone are gaffing about something deeper in the Cornucopia, going through the rest of the supplies that need to be sifted through. Hero and Victoria are even further away from the group, the two sitting on top of one of the planters and ripping leaves off of the trees, speaking in hushed voices. Only her and Marcus are apart, and he is over in the corner, wiping down a few of the arrows over and over again in his quiver, the bow behind him.

Valencia looks out into the arena darkness, and illuminated by a halo lamp is the spot where she retrieves her sword, the largest blade in the arena. The spot where Galiant falls and is impaled is just beneath that, and if she tilts her head to the left some, the light encompasses the gilded spike, it is still a fresh coat of cardinal, putrid scarlet, and she swallows after that. It is the Hunger Games, death is a key component, yet something in her feels dastard for even committing the deed.

It occurs to her, then, that Maisey is sitting right on the spot where she is just a little under ten hours ago, nearly about to be gutted by Blake's sword, her own discarded into the dirt, and she shivers, all of a sudden cold. She stands up, walking over to her district partner. Valencia has known Marcus for years, she knows about his entitlements and his ego, but at the end of the day, he's been a constant friend in all of this, and now he's killed someone, against the grain of his beliefs, of his hopes. She knows fifty seven ways - she's counted - on how to slice open a fish, or remove an eyeball out of someone's head, but now Valencia is standing in front of him, hands crossed in front of her, stuck still like one of the Stepford Wives, almost robotically swaying back and forth on her heels.

He looks up at her, then right back down at his arrows, swiping the one that is still speckled with Blake's blood up and down with the rag currently clenched in his hands. "Hey," he says, tone small, as if he is trying to push a blockage out of his throat.

Valencia crouches down to him, ignoring the burn. "Are you okay?" With the absolute disdain he has had towards injuring others, something clearly must've been switched inside his head for this to happen.

Marcus doesn't react to her question visibly, but she gets the feeling he's lying. "I'm fine," he pauses his hand motions, and then resumes cleaning the shaft of the arrow. It is a stain that'll never wash out, she is sure, a reminder of what he's done, of what he'll continue to do if he wishes to escape the arena alive. That'll only happen over Valencia's dead body, sure enough, as there is no way she'll just lay down on the train tracks and be run over by an oncoming beast of a machine.

"Thank you," she says. In the Hunger Games, it almost feels redundant to have to even express gratitude for being saved, as there can be fates worse than death that she may very well experience. There is no way she can truly repay Marcus for what he's done if the end result is death once the curtain falls, but her saying it to him relinquishes something in Valencia. A lack of compassion, perhaps, she isn't sure.

He shakes his head. "You don't have to thank me, Val."

"I mean it," and she sits down this time, physically, right next to him. "You saved my life, Marcus. I'd be dead had you not and I-" This single moment, that one solidarity frame of time where Blake's sword hovers above her neck, about to be brought down and cut the flesh clean, and then her opponent lets out a terrified scream, vaulting over, with an arrow in the back of his head. Only one person is using a bow and arrow that she knows of, and when Marcus collides with her in a hug, she has to bite down on her tongue to not cry, to not reveal such a sign of emotion. Not that crying is a weakness, but she isn't exactly sure if that moment is one that deserves the unleashing of an emotion such as tears. Something, however, is eating away at her, a thought that will not go away no matter how hard she tries to ignore it. It is something simple, purely simple yet hard to get out of her head. Valencia bites on her lower lip. "Why'd you do it?"

Marcus furrows his eyebrows together. "Why'd I do what?"

"Save me." Valencia is serious with this question. All the warning signs are pointing to the fact that she should be dead, and here she is, alive and well - perhaps not _well,_ but Valencia is not going to think about that one too hard - and now Marcus has actually killed another tribute despite swearing that he wouldn't.

Her district partner hangs his head down low some, holding a hand to his mouth, and Valencia notices that he's _shaking._ He's absolutely shaking. "I couldn't watch you die. I don't think I would've been able to stomach it."

"Oh, Marcus..." she breathes out, eyes welling up with tears. She's never deserved him.

She reaches out for his hand, or maybe his neck if she wishes to be morbid, when Persephone emerges deep from the Cornucopia, Milor on her heels. Everyone stops talking, and Valencia's hand is frozen out in time, words that she'll never say hovering in midair, warming up the atmosphere, leaving everything else in its wake behind it. Victoria stands up, Hero moving behind her a bit more at bay.

"What is it?" she asks.

Persephone holds up eight separate pieces of paper, and in her other hand, pens. Valencia's mouth goes dry. The very first vote off. It is almost as if there is an unspoken rule that passes between them, the Careers all go up to Persephone and take a sheet of paper and a pen. Hero is about to start writing down some name when a light goes off in Valencia's head. Team leader after all. Her voice needs to be heard.

"Guys, wait," she interrupts the thought processes, and seven pairs of eyes all flock to her, startling her for a moment. "Even though we can't actually look at each other's vote, shouldn't we maybe agree on one or two names we could all write down? Like... other threats and stuff?" That would be the most logical explanation, she's pretty sure, but for some reason everyone else's facial expressions are telling her that they'd rather not go down her avenue. Confusing, but she isn't the one designing the rules.

Maisey frowns. "Didn't the Head Gamemaker say there'll be four of these total?" Everyone collectively nods for her assurance. "I'd say we hold off voting like one until the latter rounds; I imagine we'll all still be a group by then," Valencia bites hard on her tongue to say that she's absolutely in the wrong, but patience and kindness compels her to walk forward with hand gloves. Even beyond that, which surprises her as Persephone, Milor, and Marcus all seem like bright people, they nod to Maisey's beat instead.

"I'd rather do that," Milor admits, and Carrion shakes his head in agreement.

Valencia's heart sinks. So much for having the greater numbers. They all have their pens, their sheets of paper, and she scoots a bit away from Marcus. She looks around at her fellow Careers, and a stark, cold dagger of ice stabs her in the heart. Any single one of them is fair game in the entire arena. She's the highest scoring tribute out of all of them, and while that may make her the leader, the Alpha Career, it just makes the target on her back that much larger. Which of her so called allies would vote for her? Is Marcus going to save her life just to have the chance to vote her off?

How much of herself is she going to have to sell to stay alive? What will remain of her soul once she's finished giving it all away?

She shakes her head, clicks the end of the pen, and gets to writing.

Only time will tell if everyone else instead decided to jump on her back and kill her.

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Marcus Pharadane** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ] / **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Persephone Castor** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

District 3: **Rochelle Pascal** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by santiago poncini20_ ] / **Maisey Rovneay** [ _Submitted by_ _Tiger outsider_ ]

District 5: **Edwin Bishop** [ _Submitted by IciclePower33_ ] / **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 6: **Corvus Raynott** [ _Submitted by LKiraApple_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon]_ / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 9: **Marissa Herdier** [ _Submitted by_ _Reader Castellan_ ]

District 10: **Hero Slade** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ] / **Victoria Armstrong** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ] / **Alexandra Quinn** [ _Submitted by SparrowBirdEliza_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **There we are everyone, the next chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, #25: Selling Their Souls, and no one died this chapter, woohoo! Tensions are already ramping up, tributes are thinking about the next step, friendships have grown tighter, and I cannot wait for the next couple legs of the journey that we will be enduring.**

 **If you haven't gotten your vote in for this first round, make sure you get it in as soon as you can. The vote off section of the next chapter, #26, will be written no later than on the fourteenth. If you do not have a vote in by then, I will be using RNG to determine your tribute vote, which may or may not end well in your favor. If you would like to change the tribute you have voted for between now and the 14th, notify me and I'll make the change for you, as long as it is in reason - I won't change your vote seven times because you are indecisive - and make sure, when you're voting for the tribute you want out, that you come to that conclusion on your own. Since I am operating this story as non-biased, I want you guys to do the same. I do not want a rigged SYOT ladies and gents, and that is all I will say on that matter.**

 **Beyond it, I hope you guys have enjoyed the first half of the story - can't believe we're already there - and on the day I am writing this, February 9th, it is (or I suppose, _was_ ) this story's two month anniversary! Twenty-four chapters, 142k in two months... yeah, I might be a crazy writer, idk, I don't care haha. Please review, you guys, as those just fill my heart with joy and it is definitely fun reading what you all think. I shall see you all soon enough with Chapter #26: Temptation by an Angel, where we go back to the Capitol for another drama filled chapter. I hope you all have an amazing day! I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	26. Temptations By an Angel (Capitol Plot V)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #26: Temptations By An Angel, another leg into the Capitol character storyline, and the chapter that shall include the very first tribute vote-off. That's dastard, I know! And I can't believe I am doing this, but we get a new point of view today, one last, one final Capitol character to meet, even though he's been referenced, and then also finally after twenty-three chapter since his conception, the return of another victor. A lot to cover, a lot will happen, and I hope you guys are psyched. Enjoy Chapter #26: Temptations By An Angel.**

* * *

 ** _Hector Merviere: Victor of the 77th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

This is starting to get ridiculous. He knows that lateness is often an attribute with his brother, but half an hour is starting to push the envelope a bit, perhaps too far at this point. Hector Merviere, the victor of the 77th Hunger Games, also from District 10, looks at his watch for the umpteenth time since he arrived at the bar. He does it almost as if the action of looking down at his wrist is all of a sudden going to accelerate time. Hector snorts at the thought. As _if._ Wouldn't that be nice, though? He wants to accelerate past this year of the Hunger Games, to go back lying down next to the sounds of grazing cows and cawing roosters, instead of being coiled in fake wealth and linen sheets that taste acidic in the back of his throat.

When it reaches twenty minutes into the supposed meeting he is to be having with his brother, Hector orders a drink, and somewhere in heaven, a foundation of God's holy temple collapses. He is the hardline definition of sober, but leave it to Arizona to be the one to get him to start his alcoholic period over again. He's six sips into his shot of whiskey, taking the most miniscule of sips as he wishes to savor the liquor. The fact that Hector has to break out the extreme measures is just another tally on the chalkboard of reasons as to why his brother is insufferable.

It's been quite the hectic day already in the tribute center, one of the District 8 victors flipping their table when Galiant is killed, and half of the victors, Hector disengaging from the conversation, turning on poor Eleven when Caiden, without mercy, throws the blade into that one girl's back. Hector stands back with Arizona as a few of the victors engage in a very toxic fight, some guns being used - he's referring to muscles, not physical weapons, as there aren't any in the Viewing Center - and that is when he realizes that he needs a bit of fresh air.

So he finds himself sitting on a random bar downtown with people crowded around the television screens looking at the Games, when nothing exciting ever happens after the bloodbath. There is that spat between the District 12 male and District 9 female that causes Hector to look away from his cards and such, but everything else has been a snooze fest. The real action starts tomorrow, at dawn, when everyone is acclimated, as there is never such a large wipeout of tributes beyond the bloodbath anymore. Gone were the days of wiping out half the Career pack due to an explosion, or a ravenous mutt killing seven tributes in its rampage. While Gamemaker deaths still occur, as that is the designing of the arena after all, the amount of deaths caused by them has come to an all time low.

His arena is a washed out lake that overgrew into a forest. That's all there is in his arena, trees and trees for miles, but underneath the dried out basin is a cave system filled with bloodthirsty bats that could stand up on feet and were three feet tall, only coming out at midnight and staying out in the arena for an hour before going back under. Hector looks down at his hands, flesh still scarred, torn into bits from fighting a tribute separated by a barbed wire fence. Slashing through the small gaps with a blade no larger than the distance from the top of his head to his mouth. The duel ends when his foe has their outfit snagged on one of the barbs, unable to rip free, and he drives the blade straight through the guy's neck.

Hector swears that some of the bloodstains still appear on his hands when he looks down at them long and hard enough. He's been gazing down for the last fifteen seconds or so and no red spots have shown themselves yet, so he might be in the clear. So he hopes, oh so he hopes. Hector and hope go together, like yin and yang, cotton and gin, corn and butter. That last analogy makes him very hungry, so he hails down the bartender and orders a salad. It appears in front of him, yet he still does not pick up his fork. He stares at the salad, frowning.

It is almost hypocritical of him, to eat some Capitol salad when his tributes might very well be starving in the arena. They _aren't,_ he knows this, talking to Kevia, Lance, Ellison, and Hale before getting up to leave for the bar, but something still doesn't sit right with having this. He waves the waiter over, shrugging, and hands him the salad. Yes, he has to pay for it still, but it's an act of kindness, right?

Somehow, though, he is still holding onto the fork. Shadows move behind him, as Hector can see the shadows fall onto the wall in front of him. He tenses, holding out the fork, down by his side in case, _just_ in case. It's unlike for the stranger to attack him, but in the Capitol nothing is a sure hundred percent anymore.

"You're late," he says.

"Bill me," Arizona says back, joining his brother at the counter, opting to stand instead of sitting down next to Hector. His brother is a bit disheveled, dark hair curled into shambles, his collar all unkempt, and there's an air of excitement buzzing around him, energy bristling off of his skin, making Hector's hair on his arms all stand up.

"You look like a mess."

"You can bill me for that too." His brother is insufferable, but he loves him all the same, right?

Hector narrows his eyes, setting the fork back down on the counter. He almost cannot believe the hypocrisy, but he won't go and verge that far on the topic, they still have a Hunger Games to possibly win. "Why're you late? You know our routine, we meet at some bar downtown during the first night to scope the scene," he crosses his arms. "For the last ten years we've done this and you haven't been late. Why now?" He knows, Hector can practically smell her on his collar, and can see the fossil blueprints of her lips on his neck, hands digging into her husband's scalp. All Hector wants is for Arizona to admit it, since it seems that his brother has a hard time telling the truth whenever it comes up.

Arizona gives Hector a sly smile, as if they're still both five and sixteen anymore. Hector has to remind himself all the time that the victor, his brother, is still technically a child. He just turned thirty, still discovering the world, while Hector is just barely breaking the light of day in his forties, a bit more wizened, gray hair sprouting from his chin, sorrowful wrinkles appearing around his eyes.

"I decided to have Hale stop by the apartment," Arizona is referring to an apartment he owns in the heart of the city, overlooking a gorgeous vista of crimson king trees and a botanical garden where he can hear the canaries sing as sunlight falls through the glass roof that adorns the ceiling.

"And?" Hector raises his eyebrow.

"And we might have a third child..." his brother smirks, and then, as Hector widens his eyes, Arizona waves his hands back and forth. "I'm kidding, Hector! We just kissed, that's all. I wouldn't be dumb enough to have another child with her right now; she's stuck with mentor duties till the 104th."

Hector pinches the bridge of his nose. He has stayed pretty much out of all the affairs for his brother's romantic life, knowing about he and Hale's relationship, their marriage, the fact that they have children, but he has kept his lips sealed on the matter for the most part, as he is not going to control another grown man's decisions like this, especially when Arizona is the violent one of the two in becoming victor.

He decides to turn face right instead, facing the wall, matching shadows linked together in the presumable destruction of the Merviere name. Hector takes another quick sip of his whiskey, wincing as it goes down. He cannot endure his liquor, and there's no shame in him admitting it. "You need to be careful, Arizona. Sooner or later, someone's going to catch on about you and her and we're all going to get thrown into jail together."

"I think you worry too much. We aren't seen in public,"

Hector flashes Arizona a glare. "I am not willing to just push Calhoun and Bonnie's tempers aside. Our president speaks of tradition like its a birthright of his. What do you think would happen to your family, to her, to _me,_ if you're caught? Have either one of you ever really thought about what could happen?"

"It's come up," Arizona rubs his shoulder, bothered enough to take a seat.

For Hector, this victor of his, his supposed partner in crime - they haven't had another victor from District 10, perhaps this year could be the return of something - he has to remind himself that he's still his younger brother, a little duckling that has to walk in line lest he be separated from the pack and devoured like some little sheep led to the slaughter, a lamb with a gun placed between his eyes, all the while he is distracted by the tongue of his lover. That is how he'll be snuffed out, he bets, that they'll get him through Hale, but the last thing he needs to do is even mention it.

"Besides, you already spend seven months out of the year up here in the Capitol," Hector adds. "You like it here."

"And there shouldn't be anything wrong with that," his brother is quick to defend himself.

"There isn't," the victor raises his hands slightly, "But it certainly doesn't help that you're with a victor from a Career district like Two. If you loved someone from Four-" Arizona opens his mouth to object rather hotly, as the victors from District 4 are hideous witches with seaweed for hair and narwhal horns for fingers, but Hector overrides the complaint, "There might not be such a problem. But Two? That is the Capitol's pride and joy, as they produce the strongest of the strongest. They give us outliers the most amount of trouble," Hector takes another sip. "Because you spend so much time around Bonnie, and Calhoun, and Lewlyn, and Pollux, you think you're one of them. Ari, you aren't," he looks at his brother with this statement. "Just because you join them for their cocktail parties at their mansion, and just because during the Games all of us men hang out with Calhoun for retconning, you aren't a Capitolite," he shrugs. "And since we are victors, we aren't citizens of our district anymore, famously ostracized," Another sip. "We don't belong anywhere. Fallen angels who aren't evil enough to become demons, and who are too corrupt to rejoin heaven..." Hector downs the rest of the whiskey.

He has no idea where that came from. Perhaps the alcohol.

Arizona narrows his eyes, frowning. "You're drinking again?"

"Thanks to you," Hector scowls into the empty cup, knocking it back again even though there isn't a single drop of amber liquid in the bottom of the shot glass. It is therapeutic. What Arizona finds comfort in, such as broken bottles, jagged pieces of glass, tassels of rope, barbed wire fences... Hector sees the beauty in emptiness, trying to refill emptiness with the greatest of all things. "That is not meant to be taken negatively," he adds a moment later, placing the cup on his lower lip, feeling the coldness of the glass.

"I'm sorry," his brother looks down at his hands.

"Don't waste your breath. Your sympathies won't help me."

"Hector-"

"Ari," Hector lifts his head up at the ceiling, swallowing. "Stop. Just... stop..." he exhales a shaky breath, pushing the glass to the side. "I want you to be careful, okay? Just because we aren't reaped into a Hunger Games arena anymore doesn't mean we're not still fighting for our lives. It doesn't stop just because we win. All that changes are the stakes."

Arizona doesn't say anything, he just sits there, pressing his tongue up against his cheek, the feeling of defeat flowing through his veins. Hector feels vindicated, almost poisoned, in a way. Slow breaths bring out slower actions, where his chest rises at the same speed of molasses dripping off of a spoon. The waiter comes by and Arizona orders a martini, and Hector slaps another bill down to get a second shot glass, which is placed in front of him. Hector looks at the tiny amount of fluid ounces stuck in the chamber, a bullet of alcohol shot from a gun that causes so much damage when it slides down his throat, burning flesh, and landing like a rock in his stomach.

There is a TV on the side of them, but Hector hasn't looked at it all evening; he doesn't want to. He's pretty sure the cameras are primarily focused on the Careers, as it has been quite sometime since there's been an alliance of eight tributes in the Games, let alone an alliance featuring outlier districts in the alliance, and that's huge as it is also the two of them, not just Victoria, or _just_ Hero.

His brother seems to be picking the drift up a bit, by the way Hector tries to steal a glance at the screen but nothing compels him to give a full fledged stare. "How are our stars doing?" There's a tint of bitterness behind the statement, which Hector snorts at.

"Just peachy," he says.

"They've wedged themselves apart," Arizona looks down at his lap, his tone sorrowful. Hector furrows his eyebrows together. Before he leaves to go down to the bar, he watches them through their cameras, and the two seem to be normal and fine, talking and chatting by themselves while the Careers situate things. "Hero told Victoria he loved her."

" _Love?"_ Hector nearly chokes on the next sip he takes of his drink. He sputters, wiping at his mouth. "I knew they were close, but he _loves_ her? Jesus, Arizona!"

"That's why he volunteered, remember?" Arizona frowns. The two have discussed this over and over again, to death especially on the train rides. Hero should be back in District 10 alone, living his normal life, and then when the time came for him to truly be lethal, he'd volunteer... but since he jumps the shark, there's nothing either one of them can do at this point. "He loves Victoria so much that he would be willing to die for her. To get her home."

"And now that he's put himself out there?"

"She rejected him."

"As she should've," Hector agrees, nodding. There's no time for love in the arena. He thinks, fleetingly, of Milor and Carrion, the two having been found naked in the former's bed. It is cute, it is adorable, but their relationship won't last... it's just a last minute screw to hold onto their humanity.

"Except Hero didn't take it very well..." Arizona bites on his lower lip.

"What do you mean?" Hector frowns. This isn't good. That puts a definite stop in plans, and somewhere in the victor's head, the record playing melodious blues come to a screeching halt. The two lock eyes.

"Hero told me this morning before he left that he's over her. She broke his heart, apparently-"

"He's fifteen!" Hector interrupts, throwing his hands up in the air. "He doesn't even know what love is. I-"

Arizona holds a hand up to stop his brother's tirade. "I know, but this is Hero we're talking about. He isn't the sensible one, and we've known that for the longest time. Anyways..." a long sigh is drawn out. "When the right times comes, whatever that may be, he's going to kill her. He figured out that she'd simply kill him to get home even if he admits he'd sacrifice himself, and that's, well..." Arizona claps his hands, shrugging his shoulders. "That's how the cookie crumbles."

Hector snickers into his drink, he downing the rest of the glass. "Who's actually the biggest idiot here? Hero for loving her, or us for thinking either one of them could win?"

"I'd say we've made our fair share of mistakes."

"Did Hero say who he was going to vote for tonight if he'd survive?" Hector asks. "And not a Career, I hope," he quickly adds, wondering if that is going to be the case if there is somehow a way to tell him to abort that thought before everything gets put out there for Panem to see. The last thing he needs is the six mentors of the real Careers seeing that their little duo votes for tributes in their alliance, to then have the six who can make or break their tributes' lives all up his ass.

"He didn't say. What about Victoria?"

"All she said was that she's smart enough to know who to vote for. Whatever that means."

Hector pushes the glass aside, flinching as it clinks with the other. How long has it been since he's heard the clinking of glass like that, knowing full and well what had been in the moments before, and also knowing where its contents went. A chill runs through him, and he squeezes his eyes shut. Today has been an emotional day, and the beginning of the Hunger Games is always the worse, but with only six deaths in a bloodbath, things have been relatively light, a relativeness he genuinely appreciates. No one is going to rake them over the coals anymore.

Arizona pushes his chair back, stretching, the sound of popping bones and muscles filling the silence.

"I'm gonna head back into the Viewing Center. Hale mentioned they might be serving hot chocolate or something. Do you want me to make you some?"

"No, I'm fine," Hector lies through his teeth. He's dying of thirst; alcohol has always done this to him, making him thirstier despite the fact he's consumed a drink just moments earlier. Personally, he wants the scalding liquid so it can burn a hole through his throat; there wouldn't be a better feeling than that one. At his answer, Arizona nods, going to head out, when Hector turns in his chair, resting an elbow on the cold metal. "Ari?" he calls. It is such a childish nickname, and even Hale uses it as a term of endearment, which makes him feel all sticky when saying it as well, but it is definitely one way to get his brother's attention. Arizona stops in his tracks, looking back at his brother. "Please be careful."

There's no response from his brother, but Hector is certain that the message is going to get through on some wavelength, good or bad, that he isn't so sure. Arizona shuffles his hands inside his coat, and out into the Capitol darkness he goes. Hector looks away, biting on his lower lip, a hollowness rattling around his bones, ghastly whispers sliding down the back of his neck.

A temptation lies down in him, somewhere, but it is something he hasn't found yet, nor does he know what that temptation is. He knows of its presence.

The alcohol does not help it either.

Hector steals a glance back at the TV screen, mouth falling slightly agape. In their conversation, the vote had already been taken, and the final result displayed on the screen.

The dead tribute?

Well... he certainly didn't expect that.

* * *

 ** _The Being Who Is Eternally Quiet_**

* * *

His arms tremble when he lifts them up to his throat, fingers gently pushing up and down on the bruise marks, splotches of deep navy submerging under pasty white flesh. He swallows at just the right speed for it to feel painful. Rennie looks at himself in the mirror, lips half open, almost like he's pursing them, pushing on his bruises. They're already starting to slowly disappear away from his skin, as if they weren't ever there in the first place. The lengths he goes to.

When he steps back into his old apartment only a few hours ago, there are tears welling in his eyes, but they do not fall from his face. Crying has always been for the emotionally weak, and he is not emotionally weak. Everyone in the Capitol likes to assume he is some wilting flower, in which he laughs to himself. Oh how well he plays the game. His apartment is left exactly the way it is from that night, so long ago now, where the pain blossoms on the remnants of his tongue like a faint memory. His bed spread is still tossed back from when the Peacekeepers rip him out of it, and the dried black spot on his carpet in the living room is indeed the last living evidence of his old appendage, tossed into the fire and burnt away.

In the corner of his bedroom is a violin, his hands picking up the mahogany wooded instrument, running a finger loosely over one of the strings. He holds the bow in his hands, lightly streaming that across his forearm. This is what times past had been for him, a world where Rennie Davis has no stock in the Hunger Games, and all he does is perform concerts for thousands of fans in sold out venues and amphitheater night after night, bowing to thunderous applause, shaking diplomats hands, receiving kisses on the cheeks, and fine, handsome checks to deck out his apartment in whatever he chooses. Lewlyn goes to every show, and she is the first to leap to her feet, clapping giddily, and it has never occurred to him that his closest ally would be his worst nightmare.

The games are on in the background, it nearing time for the tributes to vote off their first victim, and Rennie's head swimming at the possibilities of what might happen, as there'll be complete and total fallout tomorrow at the Gamemaker Center for whichever tribute succumbs to the wrath of the rest. Even if he is released from Lewlyn's spell, nothing frees him away from working with Bonnie, from dancing with the devil in a red dress, a mask hiding the natural beauty of her face. He will still have to show up and work under her helm, observe all the gory details of the arena from afar. The best part of being on the mutation scene is that he has the nights off, a mutt death never occurs at night, it isn't in the programming he, Bonnie, and the rest of the team construct.

Rennie returns to his living room, turning the lights off to his bathroom, sitting down on the couch. He's made a nice cup of coffee for himself, snuggling up against a pillow, mindful to not squeeze too hard in case the self-inflicted wounds on his arms flare up again. He'll look away in the end of it all, after the voting is commenced, as he does not like witnessing the death of the less fortunate.

He is about to take another sip of his coffee when there's the ringing of his doorbell, he nearly spilling his drink, something he is immensely grateful that he doesn't do. The burning would be to similar to the metal tongs that hold his tongue in place, and he is trying to think as hard as he can away from those memories. Rennie glares at the door, locking his jaw. Only Lewlyn and Pollux should inevitably know about his release and subsequent freedom, and he's damn sure that the Master of Ceremonies is going to be avoiding him at every turn for being made an example of.

The Avox gets to his feet, dusting off his pants, setting the mug of coffee down on the glass table in front of him. He grabs the speaking pad next to him, always close to his side just in case he needs it, hugging it tight to his body. Rennie can hear the person's breathing on the other side of the door, despite the noise levels in his room being quite high with the sound coming from the television screen, and the general nightlife of the Capitol outside. Losing one sense, such as his ability to speak, heightens his other functions. The breathing seems to be feminine, if that is even possible.

Rennie opens the door, and he takes a sharp inhale of his own, nearly choking on it.

Bonnie Rodney is standing in front of him, her mouth rather flatlined, which curves into a smile when she sees him. His heart immediately begins to hammer in his chest, and he is sure every alarm in his head blared to the maximum level of alert they could reach. He realizes, with almost a jumping back motion, that she hasn't even said anything yet; instead, the president's wife is looking over at him, since this must be the first time in quite some time she's seen him without his traditional outfit decked in red. Rennie hates that color now, and he's always thought about changing his hair color since it is a bright auburn, the flame of a roaring autumn, but he is unable to part with it. His Avox uniform is stuck in his closet, and he thinks about burning it or putting it in the trash, but as his hands touch the fabric while it falls away from him and onto the floor, he is unable to part with it.

He's switched out of that ghastly, unaccommodating, unappealing red jumper into a crisp pair of dark dress paints and a white button down, simple yet classy. Had he spilled his coffee all over him, this reaction might've been entirely different. He doesn't even make a move to grab his tablet, he simply lets Bonnie's eyes appraise all over him, and when she reaches his eye level, the left side of her mouth tilts up.

"So your sister wasn't lying. She really did let you go," Bonnie sounds partly saddened by that, and he wishes beyond anything to be able to speak, but the syllables never come out, and instead he can only furrow his eyebrows together, frowning. "May I come in?"

What would happen if he slams the door in her face?

His mind immediately wanders back to the last time the two of them were left alone together, where she tries to kiss him on the second level of the Gamemaker Center, and how he violently pushes her away. It may be a simple gesture in reality, but the very foundations of his soul experience a tremor when he does this, as the level of hurt reflected in her stare is enough to freeze his bones.

Instead of slamming the door in her face, which is more than likely the better option, he steps back, sweeping his right arm wide in an arc. Bonnie steps into his apartment, a place she's never been in, and he closes the door behind her, hands going for the tablet.

 _How do you know where I live?_

Bonnie shrugs off her gray shawl currently wrapped around her shoulders. "Easy, I looked your name up in the registry. Your address was never eliminated from the database." She puts her hands on her hips, looking around. His own living quarters will never be as fancy as the presidential mansion by any regard, but it is nice in a comforting sort of way that only he can relate to. "I see you like the black and white aesthetic," Bonnie comments.

 _It's the easiest type of decorations to find._

She makes her way to the couch, laying down rather haphazardly. Rennie sits down next to her, trying to keep his distance, willing himself to not fall back into the cushions. He keeps his arms at his sides, folding in a bit.

Bonnie looks down at her hands, then, biting down on her lip over at him. His heart skips a beat, even if it is just some sort of precursory glance, as dammit, she is the single most beautiful person he's ever seen, and her very existence torments him so, even if she has no malicious intent whatsoever in her body. He wants to grab her by the face and kiss her, have a hand ride up her backside, the other nestling into the front spaces, the forbidden fruit of a woman's flesh so to speak, but then reality sets in and he's throwing up in the toilet moments later.

"You look very handsome. I think white is a good color on you."

 _Thank you._

Bonnie opens her mouth to say something else, but instead the center window on his TV screen enlarges back to the arena. In their own pockets, in their own windows, as if they are trapped in their own little worlds, are the eighteen tributes left alive, displayed in two rows of nine, in district order, Valencia first, Colt last. In their hands are long white strips of paper, and the other fist not holding the paper are pens and pencils, the tributes holding onto them for dear life. It is nearly revolting, at least to Rennie, who may be the only Capitol citizen to feel this way, at how all _different_ they all look. Just twenty-four hours ago they're tromping over Pollux's stomping grounds as if they own them, which may certainly be part of an act, but this is strange, how each of them have a look of loss in their eyes, or a sense of aloneness, and maybe even the twisting tendrils of despair are starting to force themselves into the tributes souls.

Even the Careers do not have the same sparkle and shimmer that the victors profess they do; in the end, they are scared, frightened children fending off other scared, frightened children for their own, meaningless lives.

An unidentified voice, perhaps just some automated recording, speaks, and the tributes get to hurriedly writing. It is an odd picture, Rennie's mind trying to comprehend it, as some tributes take longer than others to think of a name, or they put their slip of paper towards the camera slower than others. Off to the side of the eighteen tribute cameras is a table, with the name of the tribute and their subsequent vote, which is what Rennie has attention focused on rather than the individual screens.

Valencia's vote is for Colt, and that causes him to raise an eyebrow. Obviously no Career is going to vote for another Career, but Colt? Where's the strategy behind that? Marcus's vote is even stranger, it being for Rochelle, someone who Rennie has to actually then look over at the sectored off screens to remember who she is. Ah, District 3 female, lost her district partner, and unfortunately... pretty irrelevant.

Persephone makes the first smart decision of the Games, her vote being for Peri. Rennie has no idea where the girl's strength all of a sudden comes from, as Lewlyn is scouring over the girl's records before the Bloodbath begins to pack up Linden's claim of her leukemia, which is indeed the truth. He looks over at Bonnie fleetingly for a moment, but she is silent in any sort of reaction. Part of him wants to dissect, right here and now, why she's watching the tribute vote-off with him when she should be with her husband, but even Rennie is unable to tear his gaze away from the television.

Milor's vote goes towards Caiden, which seems to be another sound decision. An untapped darkness lies inside the District 11 male, that in which Rennie can feel the sliminess go over his entire body like a cocoon, mendacity, greed, violence, rage, psychopathy, and more that causes shivers to slide up and down his arms. Rochelle, poor missus irrelevant has her eyes set on the largest target indeed, the girl from District 3 writing down _Valencia_ as the person she wishes to vote off. He finds it to be a strong vote, after all, she's the highest scoring tribute, _and_ a Career.

Maisey seems to mind meld with Milor, her vote going towards Caiden as well, and so far it looks like it'll be the guy from Eleven who will be falling first in this tribunal vote, which is surprising to Rennie. Surely a Career would be one to fall. He raises his eyebrow at Carrion's screen, the Career himself voting for another Career, the name on his paper being _Victoria._ He frowns. Why would allies in an alliance vote for one another? What would be the purpose behind that? Part of him desires, a craving deep down, to go and tell Lewlyn to change the vote to a publicly known one, instead of it simply being one where the total tally is put up on screen, just to get the tension rolling over to a boiling point inside the arena.

Annabellina, who seems to be in a battle inside her head - Rennie has been keeping a close eye on her, one hand on the emergency button at all times concerning the girl from Five - also votes for Victoria, but Rennie isn't quite so sure if this vote is even one that has been emotionally sound, so to speak. Edwin votes for Annabellina, ironically enough, but it doesn't garner an eyebrow raise from the Avox. That's easy enough; he saw the footage, she tried killing him, he's terrified of her, and he wants her out of the way. Easy.

However, when the next four tributes in a row - Corvus, Peri, Linden, and Marissa - all vote for Victoria, as Rennie goes down to get a sip of his coffee, he chokes on it, sputtering, rocking his body a bit forward, coffee sloshing onto his shirt. He's unable to even really notice it, as he's rather leaning into the TV, looking at the sidebar, where the tallies next to the female Career from District 10 skyrocket up to _six,_ where one third of the tributes in the arena singled her out? Why her? Why Victoria?

The girl herself, completely unaware of what has just happened, votes for Colt. Her district partner, Hero, chalks one towards Linden, a likely well choice, but it is unfortunate that both District 10 tributes just sealed their fates... no matter who District 11 or Colt votes for, Victoria is the one going down and dying.

At the end of it all, in which Lewlyn displays the tallies up on the arena dome, wide and holographically blue for all the tributes to see, the final results come in like so, chalking all the tributes with a vote towards them from least to greatest.

 _Rochelle ~ 1 vote_

 _Peri ~ 1 vote_

 _Linden ~ 1 vote_

 _Annabellina ~ 2 votes_

 _Caiden ~ 2 votes_

 _Colt ~ 2 votes_

 _Valencia ~ 3 votes_

 _Victoria ~ 6 votes_

It is official, Victoria is the one to go. Bonnie sits up after this is revealed, her face rather demure. "Not who I expected," she says dismally, but unfortunately, there isn't much she can do about it now; the rules have stated that rigging is off-limits, and the only case there could be any Capitol involvement is if there is a tie, it is up to Calhoun himself to make that decision on which tribute lives or dies.

"I promise you, none of us voted for you!" Rennie can hear Valencia say to Victoria, the girl getting to her feet, picking up her sword, holding it out defensively. There is a look of terror in the girl's eyes, her face having gone milky white, her knuckles gripping the hilt of the blade so tightly that Rennie can see the vessels in her neck bulging out, but above all, she's looking at _Hero_ of all people, where behind her terror, there's a glare directed at him, a viciousness so strong he feels it through the screen. Everyone is looking at Victoria rather confusedly... all except Carrion, who is unable to meet her eyes.

"You did this, didn't you?" Victoria exhales shakily, looking at Hero. "Because I'm not in love with you, you have them all kill me? Some sort of deal, huh?"

Her district partner stands up, crossing his arms. "I didn't vote for you, Victoria. I didn't make anyone else vote for you," she is probably expecting warm words of comfort, but all he does is lean in, a sneer on his face. "But you getting voted out by the rest of us... it's what you deserve for treating me like trash."

Victoria's face breaks, and she starts to back up towards a hedge, a massive hedge poking on the side of one of the buildings, she shaking her head back and forth, the sword swinging haphazardly with her. Rennie clenches back onto his pillow, ignoring the protests of pain that his body is bringing him. It hasn't been discussed, how the tribute who is to die, will be killed; Lewlyn has not extended this information to him. He holds the pillow up, trying to obscure his view, but something keeps him tethered to it, an uncontrollable force that requires that he watch.

The girl from District 10 reaches the bush, where her hair is mangled up by the leaves and sticks and brush, about to say something else, when a pair of hands reaches out from the bush, grabbing her, and pulling her into the darkness. The rest of the Careers, including Carrion, all jump in surprise, Valencia having to look away. Everyone in the group except Hero has a queasy look on their face. Victoria screams audibly, something in the shrub goes _SNAP,_ and a cannon immediately fires after that.

She's gone. Victoria Armstrong is dead.

Rennie reaches for the remote, turning the TV screen off. That's it for tonight. No more Hunger Games for him, as more than likely the tributes aren't going to feel compelled to go after one another anymore, and he needs to try and block out Victoria's face from his eyes.

Neither he or Bonnie say anything for a couple minutes, just he looking at the TV screen blankly, unsure of what to do. Rennie solemnly looks down at his spilt coffee, and that is perhaps the price he has to pay for his sins over the last few days, with messing up Pollux's head and all.

Bonnie looks over at him, her eyebrows bunched together, as if she's trying to think, yet not do it too hard. "I came by tonight to ensure that the rumors were true, which they were. But... that's not the only reason why."

He picks up the tablet. _What do you mean?_

She swallows, and he watches the bob of her throat, lips parting, and he wants to cling onto her so badly, intake the elixir of her life, to snag a taste of that apple from the Tree of Knowledge, but he cannot move, he is paralyzed, stuck in place. "We can't continue seeing each other. There's too much risk at stake right now, with what has happened in my life," the president's wife stands up, smoothing out her dress. "We can be professional, Rennie, we have to be, of course, but I can't keep seeing you."

Rennie wants to scream at her, to wonder what the hell she is talking about, as they _haven't_ been seeing each other, but all he does instead is stand up likewise, dropping the tablet by the wayside and onto the couch. He extends a hand, palm outstretched, fingers splayed out like a webbed frog's foot, just so she can link her fingers with his. If this is the end of some apparently secret relationship, he should get the feeling of her touch one last time.

Bonnie cannot even look him in the eyes when she leaves his apartment, not bringing her hand up to greet his, and not even thanking him for his company.

He stands there, in that position, words dying on a tongue that'll never form, hand outstretched to grab a love that will never exist, and he weeps bitterly. He stands there all night.

Another temptation by an angel has passed.

* * *

 **18th: Victoria Armstrong, 15, District 10 Female. Killed by the tribute vote-off. Created by curiousclove. Victoria, there were plans for you, great, massive plans... and sadly, due to the rules of this Quarter Quell, I was unable to get to fully utilize them, but the time I've spent with you was fun for how long it lasted. Unfortunately, you are the first big player to go down to the mighty stroke that is the voice of the many, but I think the Careers as a whole will feel your loss. It just does go to show that nobody is safe in this arena, and that everyone else will be praying to their lucky stars that they're spared. It was a shame that this is what killed you; I will miss you, and I am sure the readers will too.**

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Marcus Pharadane** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ] / **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Persephone Castor** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

District 3: **Rochelle Pascal** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by santiago poncini20_ ] / **Maisey Rovneay** [ _Submitted by_ _Tiger outsider_ ]

District 5: **Edwin Bishop** [ _Submitted by IciclePower33_ ] / **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 6: **Corvus Raynott** [ _Submitted by LKiraApple_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon]_ / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 9: **Marissa Herdier** [ _Submitted by_ _Reader Castellan_ ]

District 10: **Hero Slade** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ] / **Alexandra Quinn** [ _Submitted by SparrowBirdEliza_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #26: Temptations By an Angel, and lemme just say, woohoo boy that was so much fun to write! I really apologize for the fact that it took me like ten days to write this (the very first section, with Hector, took me three days to write, where I ambled my way through, honestly it sucked taking that long), and then I didn't touch the document for a week cause college is actually really stressful truth be told, but it's here, we've reached the end of another chapter, and I am so happy about that.**

 **Yeah, Victoria is gone, and I cannot lie and say I am not saddened that the vote ended up in that direction, but I will not say any more on that matter. Another tribute has fallen, but brace yourselves, as the next chapter is also another tribute chapter, and there's always a chance I am taking more of their lives away forever and ever.**

 **Also, big news, we have a new Capitol character! Although I've mentioned him all the way back in the beginning prologue chapters - God, remember those? - with Hale's first point of view, we've finally got to him, our man Hector Merviere, Arizona's brother, and boy he is an absolutely fun character to write. As I ask often of you all sometimes, I would really enjoy a review of this chapter, but really more focused on he and Arizona's conversation - there was a monologue line that I wrote in it which really struck me, the one about angels and demons - and I think their snippet of this chapter is one of the strong points of this story so far, and I'd like ya'lls take on it.**

 **Beyond that, hopefully within the next week - as I am getting better at streamlining my free time - I will have Chapter #27: Where the Wild Things Went out, and we'll continue down this journey of the 100th Hunger Games, of the 4th Quarter Quell, cause hot damn it feels good to be back. Please review, ya'll, it makes my literal day, and I hope you all have great ones yourself! You guys are the best! I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	27. Where the Wild Things Went (Day 2)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #27: Where the Wild Things Went. I am super excited as we're moving on in the games fresh off another death, poor Victoria, and I have done Game planning up until Chapter 40 something which is near the very end of the games, so things will be a happening. Thank you all so much for your reviews, and keep in mind that there is also the forum for this story as well, in which I gave most of you submitters access to, so always feel free to go over to it as well. I just came back from watching Fellowship of the Ring at my college's movie theater and I am hyped for typing, so it is 1 AM and I have the case of the writing jitters. Let's get to it; enjoy Chapter #27: Where the Wild Things Went.**

* * *

 ** _Alexandra Quinn: District 11 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

This can't be good. This _isn't_ good. Alexandra winces, ducking under a few thrown stones in haste of Colt's rage. Her current alliance member stomps around their makeshift fire, smoldered out and just now rising smoke underneath a wave of boulders, Colt's face twisted in a snarl. Rochelle hasn't spoken a single word since their ally's fit that started about fifteen minutes ago. Just like she promised - she being Marissa - there is now only three alliance members around the campfire, Colt and the Ladies, as the commentary by Pollux has dubbed them to be.

She's gone. Marissa up and left early in the morning at the haste of Colt's warning, but not without taking every single with her. All the food. Colt's sword. Alexandra's pair of knives she picked up before the voting. Rochelle's backpack with several blankets and coils of wire. All taken. All _gone,_ simply because Colt couldn't keep his rage under control. Alexandra is trying to resist the smirk, trying to keep her true thoughts hidden away, but part of her wants to rub it in, rub it in _good._ However, with the current state of affairs that are happening around their campfire, Alexandra is pretty sure he could just snap her neck in two and be done with it, and the alliance would realistically only go down to _just_ him, since Rochelle would must definitely run for the hills at any real exertion of his anger.

Colt shakes his head, locking his jaw, taking a seat back on the sleeping bag. Marissa couldn't very well take that away if he is sleeping inside it. Alexandra knows that she herself is foolish, as she's the only one who didn't sleep in one, as the fire kept her warm enough. How dumb were they though to actually sleep by an openly lit fire? Every survival skill she's seem to learned over the last few days has been thrown out of the window clearly. Alexandra figures it must be relative to the arena, as the tributes aren't in some forest, or mountain, or volcanic landscape, but an amusement park, something manmade, and nothing seems to have really been altered by the presence of vicious Gamemakers; nothing she can tell, of course. She rubs her arms innocuously; they aren't threats, not really, so the Careers definitely won't be looking for them. They'll be after Caiden, or Linden, or Corvus, or perhaps each other, but definitely not them, the alliance that lights fires at night.

The boy from Twelve groans. "How could I have been so stupid?" he complains to himself.

Alexandra has a few things she could say, but she stills her tongue. There is no need in dying from his perturbed state. However, surprisingly enough, it is Rochelle that speaks for the first time since the Bloodbath, as she's been quiet the entire night. Rochelle pinches the bridge of her nose, shaking her head likewise. "Colt, what did you _think_ was going to happen?"

He looks up, furrowing his eyebrow. "I-"

"You threatened to kill her, Colt. You told her that if she wasn't gone by dawn she was a dead man," Rochelle's facial expression is that of disbelief, Alexandra figures, towards Colt's stupidity. She is just too nice to say anything, it hasn't been her way for confrontation. "We're all pretty damn lucky she didn't kill us when she left. She spared us and she most definitely had the chance," she crosses her arms. "Besides, why didn't you sleep with your sword right next to you, holding onto the hilt?"

"And skewer myself if I rolled over?" Colt snorts. "Yeah, right."

"It's your fault we don't have any of our supplies, Colt," Rochelle says, and the tone is accusatory. Just like before, just like with Marissa... odd how history has a way of repeating things.

Alexandra forgets how to breathe, as a vein in Colt's head makes its prominence known on his flesh, and she wants to cower back in case he goes and rips the girl from Three's head clean off her shoulders, but it is indeed _Colt Sheppard_ she's thinking of here, the guy who really didn't save his district partner, the guy who let Marissa walk all over him and didn't go through with his threat, the guy who didn't sleep with the only prominent weapon of the group so she could take it. The more Alexandra thinks about it, all of this, all of these faults... it's his fault.

An alliance of six strong, that is what they are supposed to be, and laughably now down to three. Gaia and Marina are dead. Marissa has left, and the remaining three are playing tango with the devil, who at any turn may twist the knife just the right way to cause all of their intestines to spill out onto the floor. When Gaia dies, it is Colt's prerogative to leave, as Rochelle knew that Deacon's demise already happened, and Marissa's attitude towards Blake is clear it is see-through. It is as if they all forgot about poor Marina, but in reality, Alexandra didn't even speak a word to her, so there isn't any real tragedy reflected in the thirteen year-old's death.

Colt sighs again, looking defeated. "You're right. It is my fault."

That is not the reaction she is expecting.

There's a comparison to made to this, however, that Alexandra can see. Colt is just like a few of her close friends back in Eleven. It is the mantra of the district, of the less fortunate, to keep their heads down, to not focus on the Peacekeepers and their rules, or the abuse, or the poverty... just to go _along_ with it, along with the torture. However, there are a few that stick up for everyone else, but the moment the pistol is drawn out, or the billy club is raised, they're groveling back into the dirt, bowing down to their superiors and begging for forgiveness. It is the ones that even in the face of death that allow for it to happen by getting out that last insult, or last golden proverb, those are the people Alexandra looks up to. Rochelle is most definitely the person with their head down, being afraid to step on any toes, just by looking at her. Colt is the poor boy who will try and speak up for the people, but in the wake of adversary, he crumbles to the will of the despots. Alexandra likes to believe she's the one looking at Father Torment in the face, giving them a kiss on their charcoal black lips before slitting her own throat.

She isn't that, sadly. She's like Rochelle, that when the going gets tough, she willingly allows it to then get worse. She wants to be those that will fight against the injustices of the world. Alexandra is unable, at the current moment in time, to look directly at her tormentor, at her district partner, at Caiden Grove, and cast him down. But that doesn't mean she won't grow into it.

Alexandra walks over to Colt, placing a gentle hand under his chin, motioning him to look at her. Their eyes lock, passionate stares of mahogany and emerald linked together. "You can beat yourself up about it later, Colt. Right now, we need to go find her; we need to move camp and go and get our stuff back. Just like how I need to get revenge on Caiden, you need to get revenge on Marissa. We can do this, Colt," she squeezes his arm, lowering her head.

Revenge is an odd word, but when she says it, it is as if there's a power that surges through her veins. Does she really have revenge to be exacted on Caiden? He played his power, showed his hand, that he isn't going to let anyone walk over him, and while she finds it masterful, it didn't have to be _her._ Alexandra picks a different instance, only going to yesterday, when he taunts her and mocks her, almost killing her, but not doing it _quite._ Why is he playing with her? Why won't he just do it already, if he's already tried twice now and proven unsuccessful?

It is the best word that she can think of though. Revenge. Something so foreign to her, yet she feels like she perfectly understands it already.

Colt nods with her, and Alexandra's heart swells.

It is time to go on a hunt. They might not have weapons, but she is pretty sure the three of them will be able to take down puny Marissa. A coward who actually believes Colt is going to kill her, since he couldn't even hurt a fly.

When Colt packs up his sleeping bag, and Rochelle does likewise to hers, Alexandra stands off by her own up against a column of the building they're standing under. She crosses her arms, turning her back away from them. She isn't upset that Marissa stole her knives, Alexandra knows that isn't her strengths and she just desperately needed a weapon. Rochelle is more than likely to be killed by some stupidity, whatever that may be. There isn't any real revenge for Colt to enact upon; someone will run him down easily.

Alexandra Quinn however? Oh, there are masterful things at work within her. It might be a good thing her district partner had revealed his hand so early in training, to make her fear what lurks around every corner. Perhaps not, but what he doesn't know won't hurt him.

It is that fire in her soul, that burning passion to watch Caiden die with his eyes gouged out, hands held behind his back, legs broken in various places... that is the type of revenge that keeps her going.

It is that fire that will have her outlast the rest in her already breaking alliance.

* * *

 ** _Maisey Rovneay: District 4 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

Some of the excitement of the Bloodbath seems to have run off like slush in a stream, out of Maisey's veins. There's still that excited skip in her step, that she knows of, and a bit of a belated happiness for being in such a beautiful arena. Whenever she looks down at her hands, they're shaking, but not shaking in the expression of nervousness, but one of excitement and anticipation. Besides, night one after the Bloodbath is usually a quiet ordeal. Everyone exerts so much effort and energy into the Cornucopia battle, in which the now only seven Career strong team - Victoria's death doesn't really affect Maisey like she thinks it would; honestly, the younger girl is just a blip on some radar and now she's gone, one less person to worry about, one less person to eliminate - are still stuck at.

However, as she looks down at her hands, Maisey's mouth goes dry as there's a few spots of Gaia's blood still clinging to her flesh, unable to be washed away. Maisey wasn't really targeting the poor girl - she is poor indeed, as she didn't even die standing on her two feet, she gave up and Maisey hates people who quit and give up - but she comes across her while nabbing up a set of knives, and there the thirteen year-old is with a clearly broken foot, so even if she is compelled to let Gaia go, there's no telling actually how far she'd make it before falling down again or getting killed by an even more vicious tribute like Caiden, because she's clearly okay in the violence department. Maisey is not intending to behead Gaia and that is all the shock she needs, as when Maisey realizes that at the end of one of the mace spikes is the tribute's head, she nearly drops the weapon.

Going back to her thought about Caiden, that is why she voted for him last night. No one else in the arena scares her - not Milor, with his puppy loving like face, where everyone expects to give him pity for his poor circumstances, but she sees right through it. The guy is a Career, scores a _Ten,_ and somehow is unable to perhaps grab a sword and make sure his father never hurts him again? Yeah, right. Maisey will believe that when pigs fly - but only Caiden... he's the only tribute out of the seventeen of them that whenever she thinks about him, she gets goosebumps all over her arms. Something about being unable to predict him, that is what frightens her the most. With the other Careers, it's easy enough, they're sociable and gaff about and hang around each other because without companionship, the alliance will crumble. They all know they'll be stabbing each other in the gut with their weapons soon enough, but when there's such a long stretch of time to kill, friendliness can form. With Caiden? That is all thrown out the window, especially if Alexandra's interview is anything to go by.

Maisey wraps a lock of her sunbeam hair around her finger, something she always does when she's bored. Every once in awhile she'll give a cautionary glance over towards Hero, who has kept to himself and not opened up one bit even after his district partner is taken through the bushes and subsequently has her neck broken. She's about to go back to sleep, as they've been up for the last few hours and haven't really done anything when Valencia, who has been off to the side with Milor and Persephone, makes her way back to the center of the group, clapping her hands and getting the others' attention.

"We need to start moving out from here," she says first off, giving a look around at them. Maisey doesn't understand why, just because Valencia scored the highest, all of a sudden means she gets to lead the pack. There's so much more she can do this Missus Shale, but she also doesn't like confrontation when it isn't needed, so she keeps her mouth shut. "We don't have a map with us, and since the arena is an amusement park, I am sure we will eventually find one. However, due to that, we don't know if the Cornucopia is in the center of the arena or on the outskirts... we're walking blind here," Valencia sounds very confident that they are not confident in their exact location.

"So what does that mean exactly?" Carrion crosses his arms. Something about him always standing next to Milor, regardless or not if they're a couple - do they not realize that not both of them are going to be able to go home? There isn't a Quarter Quell twist about this, and they aren't from the same district, so there isn't any hope of them getting out like Katniss and Peeta - irritates her, as they're district partners; shouldn't _they_ be the ones sticking together like glue?

"We're going in this place blind," Persephone pipes up. _Ah,_ the irrelevant one, Maisey recalls; she always has trouble remembering the girl's name. At least with Valencia there's competition, as she has the main spot in the Careers which she is upmost envious of, but she also isn't going to stab her allies in the back. She might want to win, most definitely, but she knows how to play fair, and that is what Maisey Rovneay is, right? Fair.

"What makes that any different from an arena like a mountain or forest?" Hero frowns, and it hits Maisey right then and there that in the grand scheme of things, he's short a district partner, making him really an island out in the middle of the ocean during a surging storm, waiting for the water to overtake him, as there's no one that automatically must take his side.

Surprisingly, it is Milor that has the seemingly correct answer, at least to Maisey anyway. "In any other arena, no one spot is truly special than another. However, this amusement park doesn't seem built... it seems like it's been here back and way before the Dark Days. That means there is most definitely places that are at a bigger advantage than just staying put at the Cornucopia. And since this is an amusement park, they used to have maps," he raises a finger, eyes bright. "There might be a map somewhere to help us navigate."

"Just take a look around," Valencia invites the rest of them, motioning outwards with her arms. "This place doesn't have any forests, or crazy hills... it's all open space. We don't know how large it is."

"So, what are you proposing we do?" Maisey raises an eyebrow. All of this beating around the bush stuff is exhausting. She just wants to get this shit over with, get the ball rolling, get the show on the road and kill some other tributes so the quicker nightfall happens, the quicker she can go to sleep. She can't stand this anymore, all this needless waiting.

Valencia smiles smugly. "We split up and take the arena in three sections; three separate paths."

"So, hunt tributes, but in pairs?" Carrion asks, to which Milor nods, and he cracks his knuckles. "I rather like that idea. How should we divvy ourselves up?"

"Valencia and I discussed it," Marcus speaks up, and Maisey nearly jumps out of her skin, forgetting that he is even there. She doesn't really know how to feel about him being let back in after making such a fuss of being let go, but again, needless confrontation that she isn't willing to deal with right now. "We should district partner pairs. She and I, Milor and Persephone, and Carrion and Maisey."

"What about me?" Hero frowns.

"If you want, you could come with us."

"Where should we meet up?" Maisey asks.

Valencia turns and points outwards through the tree line all the way to what seems to be the complete opposite of them. Amid all the steel coaster structures and wooden rides, with high rise walls that seem impossible to be broken, as Carrion tries exhaustedly last night to do so, is a tower or rather obelisk that seems to be at least three or four hundred feet high. It glimmers a pure and precious diamond in the sun, a light enough to seize Maisey's heart and make her eyes widen. "There; it seems easy enough to be found, after all. We leave whichever separate ways we decide, and try to be there by eight or nine tonight." Maisey looks at the digital clock pressed up against the arena dome, the holographic blue lines reading out _1:16 P.M,_ it being the early start of the afternoon.

"And if we don't show up?" Carrion voices concern. It is a legitimate question, for sure.

Persephone shrugs. "If you guys die, we'll hear a cannon and see your face in the sky, easy enough. If you guys haven't made it there by sunrise, we'll know you broke off from the Careers, and-"

"And at that point," Valencia picks up the hanging part of her sentence, "We'll hunt you down and kill you if you haven't died already," and probably unable to help herself, she looks at Marcus rather doggedly, her district partner tugging at his collar, swallowing. Maisey leers her eyes at him; if he's sweating, something's up. No one with nothing to hide ever gets upset. A wave of silence passes over them, rather brief but long enough to be noticed. "Anyone have any questions?"

"Nope!" Maisey laughs, grabbing Carrion, by the shoulder, turning around and running off, nearly pulling out his damn arm from its socket. She doesn't need anyone to dismiss her, she dismisses herself from the group. If Valencia wants to complain, let there be her problem.

If she's still alive - Valencia, that is - by the time the Careers split, Maisey is targeting her first. The girl won't see it coming, and when Maisey is finished, she's sure to leave more than just a broken rib. What had it been that she said while sitting on stage with Pollux for her interview? An interview that boosted her chances of winning by 45%, for all of her doubters information, actually. _"What do you think I will be willing to do to those that get in the way of my dream?_ "

Oh what would Maisey Rovneay be willing to do indeed?

Let's see how long Queen Bee can live when her workers are ripped straight out of her hands.

* * *

 _ **Edwin Bishop: District 5 Male P.O.V (15)**_

* * *

If the map is any indicator as to where he's going, Edwin is in the right to say he might've just found the most beautiful part of the arena. He looks up from it, a laminated piece of plastic that is a five fold - was that really necessary, Gamemakers, he wonders to himself when he picks it up, it just blowing haphazardly in the wind around him - the name of whatever theme park the tributes are in blotted up in black ink, but the names of the rides are all there.

One slight alteration has been made to the map; the Cornucopia is outlined on it, a golden horn smack dab in the center of the arena, equidistant to be about ten miles in either direction, and doing the math, Edwin walk or ran 3.33 hours yesterday since the Bloodbath to his current location. It takes an average person - he'll assume he's an average person for sanity's sake - twenty minutes to walk a mile, which makes it take two hundred minutes to walk ten miles, divided by sixty, Edwin gets the 3.33 right. He thinks he's correct, but there's no calculator around and there is much worse to worry about right now.

According to the map, he's at one of the farthest four points in the arena, in the second quadrant, where just beyond a very tall white wall is supposedly the ocean, the beautiful and beautiful ocean that he's always wanted to see. Darkly, Edwin realizes that one way he'll see it is when the crane picking up his dead body, but by then it is too late. In other news, however, it means Edwin is possibly the most safe tribute out there, as the Careers would still be stuck at the Cornucopia like they do every year, he knows he lost Annabellina in his panicked run where she tried killing him, Peri and Linden he saw go in the opposite direction of him, and the female centralized trio with Colt went opposite of the Careers, so all the pieces he'd be worried about are very, _very_ far away from him.

He knows he's forgetting a tribute or two, he's pretty sure their names start with the letter C, but Edwin's brain hurts from doing math and the unbelievable running he's done over the last few days, so he'll give himself a break.

Edwin looks up from the map, smiling wildly. One of the four quadrants he's stopped at houses, written on the map in some fancy manuscript, is _Botanical Gardens._ And what a sight he has indeed stepped into. The garden seems to go on forever, with a few pine trees here and there sticking out like sore thumbs, stalagmites on a rocky cave's surface. Surrounding him on all sides is a hedge wall, about seven or eight feet tall, and blooming off of it are white roses, red roses, violets, tulips, and even a few pieces of fruit here or there. Edwin inhales, sucking in a dose of the sickly sweet air, a sickly sweetness that'd almost resemble something like what he'd concoct in his lap whilst working on another experiment to test oxygen on metal.

Ivy runs up white walls, tendrils of green snaking up through a coat of snowstorm paint, flowers blooming at where the folds of ivy crisscross over one another, and in the center of the flower, where the petals converge, is a precious gemstone. Edwin approaches it, smiling, reaching out. The flower seems to react to his touch - he's pretty sure it is a lotus flower - and the petal digs into itself, popping out the stone. It shines an lustrous blue, like the sky. A sapphire. Edwin nods, closing his hand around the sapphire and tucking it into his pocket. He might as well take every single precious gemstone around him at this rate, the experience rather otherworldly.

His shoes scuffle on the cobblestone path, a rose patch to his left as he walks around a gorgeous fountain in the center of the garden. It is raised on a pedestal, the water spilling out of the center in sync with his footsteps. Edwin raises an eyebrow, grinning with it. If he steps back, water seems to come from the fountain's basin and back into the spigots. If he walks forward, water trickles out, and if he runs out, four more holes appear around the center adding more water to it. Instead of the sapphire color, like the stone he has in his pocket, the water is a light pink, like pink lemonade, and it smells absolutely confectionary. Atop the center pedestal is the Panem logo, which sours just a bit of the image for him, but Edwin looks away.

He takes a seat at a bench opposite the fountain. Unfurling the map, he spreads it across his lap. When he woke up earlier to magnanimous trumpet sound, it being Lewlyn's voice officially announcing that it is the second day of the 4th Quarter Quell, something shortly after that rude interruption of a beautiful dream does an object fly out of nowhere and across his face, scaring the living daylights out of him. After the first moment of panic recedes, in where Edwin foolishly screams as if he's back in his bedroom where mommy and daddy will come to scare the demons away, he rips off the foreign invader, and when he looks down, it's this map.

All alongside the map is this strange black powder that rubs onto his skin when he brushes his fingers over it. Sniffing it, he frowns; it smells bitter, and he does not dare taste it. A few locations that cause him to rub his chin is that there's a House of Horrors directly to the left of the Cornucopia, on the side near what would be considered the park's entrance is a mirror maze, the names of the rollercoasters in the park such as 'Velocity' or 'Renegade', but as from what Edwin has been able to tell, each coaster is blocked off. Surrounding the entrance is plaster and brick and other types of material that make getting on the rides impossible, and he's smart enough to know that breaking down walls is going to get someone's attention, and since he's going alone, that means there's no way in hell the attention he attracts will be friendly.

Edwin looks up from the map, and it takes him biting down on his tongue with as much force as his frail fifteen year-old body can exert not to scream out loud at the sudden object that appears in his vision. After taking another deep breath of the sweet, sickly sweet air, he leans back a bit. Hovering in front of him, _literally_ hovering, is a butterfly. At least, that's what Edwin thinks it is.

Of course, in a botanical garden, there will be insects flying around, or squirrels climbing up trees, and birds chirping, but Edwin's shoulders go cold when he realizes, that besides the trickling of the water, it is indeed silent, save for his laborious breaths. This butterfly however, manages to take his own away as well. It is maybe half the size of his palm, seemingly held up by a string as it floats so still on the air. It's wings are see-through, but whenever it flaps its wings, they shine like shards of stain glass, amaranthine dots falling on the cobblestone ground. He's never seen such a beautiful creature... if only he could keep this just like the gemstone.

He swallows his fear. Butterflies... that's an insect he can handle. A few of the others in that kingdom? He'd prefer to kill them with a blowtorch. Edwin gingerly extends his pointer finger of his left hand, and the butterfly indeed flies over to it, landing as soft as a feather on his skin. When the butterfly's legs make contact with his own flesh, stars explode behind his eyes, as if the butterfly is wrapped up in a velvet shaw, perhaps the softest and most precious moment he's ever experienced in his life. He is not often at a loss for words... but this, _this_ is something else.

Edwin tilts his head, blinking at the butterfly. It takes him a second to realize that its wings only flap when he _blinks,_ and the fountain only trickles water when he moves his legs... as if this place is in sync with his heartbeat. "What are you?"

Half of him expects the butterfly to respond back to him - it very well would not be the most outrageous thing he's come across since his time in the Capitol for sure - but nothing happens, the butterfly flaps its wings once more, and then it flies off, shards of light glittering in the air, and he can still feel the warmth spreading over his entire hand, now flowing to his entire arm, and Edwin is drowning in euphoria.

Something so beautiful that he'll never have.

With a sour taste in the back of his throat, it occurs to him that this is the very same thought process that probably caused Annabellina - or _Abe_ \- to awaken from the deep. Nothing will cling to him as much in his sleep as his district partner's crazed stare, the way she lifts her hand back to throw the knife that misses him by a hairbreadth, and the fact she is now a murderous tyrant, and not the damsel he's seen her as the entire week.

Did he do it? He is unsure whether or not he is the instigator, but the last thing he remembers is her kissing him, her tightly locked with him, and he freaked out, getting to his feet and running to his bedroom to sleep it off. Past that, there's nothing except her snarling at him and stabbing another tribute through the back, doing it so hard in fact that the _tribute died!_ Annabellina Circuit, the _old_ one, wouldn't have done that... what part did he play in creating this monster? A monster that now wants to kill him too...

To think he might have even thought he liked her at some point, when she presses her lips to his, their bodies flush and tight together, he rutting up on her, only to have his cheeks tinge a dark and furious scarlet with embarrassment.

Like this butterfly, something he'll never have, a jewel so precious and rich that he has no savory means of achieving it.

Edwin curls up on the bench to sleep, as the paradisal feel of the garden is too intoxicating to try and stay awake to. At some point, while he's laying there with his eyes open, looking at the fountain that has now gone dormant, the butterfly returns, this time landing in his hair, and then he hears it, _the purr._ The butterfly is purring to him, he's drowning in the feel of heaven... and he's never felt better.

It starts to rain shortly after he finally goes to sleep, and the butterfly does not leave him.

It has done what Annabellina has been unable to do.

Edwin has gone to where the wild things went.

* * *

 ** _Marissa Herdier: District 9 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

Absolute child's play. Marissa cannot still believe how lucky she's gotten with getting away with all of her alliance's stuff. Well, heavy air quotes around the word alliance. She sees through Colt's bullshit the moment he invites her in. Somehow, for some reason, this miner from District 12 has it all wrapped up in his head that he is supposed to be this chivalrous knight that will save the fair lady, the swooning and crowning maiden in the silk gown from the Hunger Games. Unfortunately, in the worlds largest hit him on the head moment, as Marissa has made herself well aware of, is that there's only one victor in the Hunger Games. How on earth could Colt expect to get all of these women, that he has now so valiantly saved from death, all to victory?

It is as if he is more involved in the fact of helping himself and his image than others. Marissa's heart is still beating rather fast and heavy, even though it has been hours since she's abandoned their makeshift camp. Without her, the brains of the operation, everything will fall to pieces. Colt can't lead, he can't even find his way out of cardboard box, and he couldn't even save his district partner, so what good is he? She's had to drop some of the needless cargo, perhaps not as intelligent as she likes to think she is, when she's carrying two backpacks, a crate of food, and trying to balance a sword in one hand without chopping off a vital body part? She needs some work.

Since 1:15 PM, it's started to rain. Rain, however, might be too light of a word, as Marissa can hardly see her hands if she stretches them out in front of her, due to the lighter load, the ground a soggy, mushy mess with a blanket of grayscale for whatever low visibility she actually might have. She's freezing cold, but Marissa knows that if she's goes inside any of these buildings that'll have air condition, she could very well freeze depending; nothing's safe, and in an arena where it had originally been man-made, Marissa is unable to trust anything.

Part of her feels like going back to Colt, already sick and tired of this rain, but she knows full damn well that'll never happen, and Marissa isn't weak like that to go crawling back on her hands and knees for forgiveness. Whenever she glances down at the sword in her hand, her mind goes into a scramble, puzzle pieces running off into the dark with no end destination in sight. She has no idea how to handle a sword, but it has to be better than nothing, better than being defenseless. If she decides to return to the rock throwing - strangely, Marissa looks back at it with some form of nostalgia, even if it is only twenty-four hours ago - that'll be no help until the torrential downpour ends as she cannot see very far.

Looking down at the blade, Marissa frowns. Why'd she spare any of them back at the campfire? Why spare Colt, Rochelle, and Alexandra? Why didn't she just draw the blade fast and quick across their throat and be done with it? Why not paint the grass in a crimson smile? Rochelle and Alexandra she can understand, sympathize with. Rochelle, bless her soul, has no direction, no purpose in these games, irrelevant and forgettable to Marissa, and Alexandra has no one she can trust, especially when her district partner stabs her in the back. Marissa is unable to understand her reasoning, without a doubt, as to why Colt is still living, as there hasn't been any cannons fired that she knows of, so she's alrighty.

Marissa boils it down to only one thing. Some strange sense of humanity, whether or not she wants to admit it, and she really doesn't. Humanity is what spares Colt, as she can freshly recall for it being just a bit ago, standing over him, the blade inches from cutting his neck open like a cut turkey on Thanksgiving Day, but she looks away, at the campfire smoldering with the white wisps floating off away that she stills her hand, walking away, head hung down in shame. The laughing only starts when she's at a safe distance, hand clutching her head, belly burning with fuel in the rear tank, heart elated... she's just betrayed someone without causing any bloodshed. How? She doesn't know.

Part of her feels like she's betrayed Blake, by letting him die. She didn't expect to see his face in the sky last night, and she didn't even vote for Colt like he probably expected her to, as he shared his vote, and Alexandra shared hers... they all shared, and Marissa didn't feel like lying, because clearly it wouldn't have even been enough, since it is poor Victoria Armstrong who fell, and it is good that a preemptive Career has gone this early in the game, as they aren't invincible.

 _And speaking of Careers not being invincible..._

Marissa stops dead in her tracks, looking to the left and right of her, and behind her, just to make sure she's not being followed. Underneath an awning of a building, lying down on a bench, if the girl's hair is anything to go by, is the female from District 2, Persephone Castor. She's sure, as with the awning, it is blocking the rain, meaning that the picture in front of her is clear, and Marissa can see who it is. Asleep. Persephone is asleep, her chest rising and falling, and underneath the bench is her famed weapon of choice, that beautiful war hammer with its decadent coat of black paint... and here she is, out and vulnerable.

She frowns, however, before taking another step. Something about all of it smells fishy, and it isn't because of the rain smelling like sewage. What random Career would just be lying down on some random bench in the arena, in a discernible location she is sure has nothing significant to it, but Marissa doesn't really know. A rile of amusement flares in her stomach, as wouldn't it be a cruel joke if the Careers just abandoned Persephone to her nap? It wouldn't be a matter of desertion, she is pretty sure, as the girl had not one single vote to her name, unlike Valencia, which should worry the head honcho of the Careers.

That's it; her decision has been made.

Marissa gently tiptoes over to the bench, looking down at the sleeping Career. A single slice to the neck, might not be as clean, but there is no way Persephone will be able to fight back... her weapon is too far out of her reach. She can do this, Marissa tells herself, she can lift the sword and kill a Career, a person with a score way too high for her. The humanity that spares Colt Sheppard is nowhere to be found, not in sight in any capacity.

What's that odd squishing noise behind her?

The girl from District 9 raises the sword high, about to swing it down.

"What's this? A tribute caught off her guard?" a voice behind her says, and Marissa freezes. There's the cold bite of steel gliding up her neck, nothing being nicked or cut, but she tries to not swallow as when Marissa looks down, there's a sword at one of her vital arteries. The voice belongs to Persephone's district partner, Milor Drusus, the Career's head tilted to the left slightly.

"I think you have the wrong idea-" Marissa begins to speak, but he edges the blade in just a bit further, enough to excite the heart rate again.

"Actually, Miss Herdier, I think you have the wrong idea," Milor's voice is cold, firm, but not as threatening as she expects it to be. "It looks like to me you were about to kill my district partner, and I'll tell you, that just doesn't sit right with me," the blade lifts from her neck a bit. "What do you say? We call it a truce? I won't slit your throat if you won't behead Seph, for me?"

"I can work with that," her mouth has gone entirely dry. If he wasn't gay, she'd be unbuckling his pants right this minute. She knows it's foolish, downright stupid of her to think that sex appeal would get her anywhere, as after all, it is her trying to seduce the stupid escort that gets her in this mess in the first place.

Milor lowers the blade from her neck, but he actually keeps it resting in the middle of her spine, and with a slight exertion of force, he could paralyze her from the waist down. "Now, what I suggest you do, Marissa, is go the other way, go back the way you came. I'll spare you for now, but if I catch you trying to kill Seph or any of my other Career partners again, I won't let it slide twice. You understand?"

Marissa nods feverishly, and Milor places a hand around her waist, pushing her back behind him, and she's now back out in the rain. She looks back at the Career pair from District 2, starting to walk away again, as he now has his back turned, caught off guard. Did that just happen? In fact, _what_ did just happen? Marissa stops in her tracks, already cold again from the rain, looking back at Milor and Persephone.

He's just going to let her go like that? That's the angle he is going to play for her? Mercy? It is the same mercy she offers Colt, without him knowing it, that might have repercussions she'll never see. Screw that. She's been told by Blake that she isn't strong enough. Milor is letting her go because she isn't strong enough. Colt's entire alliance is built on being the hero to women who aren't strong enough. If she goes back the way she came, it is back into the jaws of the leviathan that would be a pissed off District 12 Male and District 11 Female.

 _Screw that._

Milor has his own shred of humanity that is going to be his downfall.

Marissa turns, stretching her neck, gripping the sword in her left hand, and she then runs at Milor, who has his back turned. She raises the sword high, about to swing it down and catch him in the back of the head when-

Pain interrupts every single thought that is in her head, every little thought of interference now blinded by red. It is when Marissa looks down at the sword in her stomach, and then at Milor's tormented expression does she realize what she's done, and what he's done, and what's going to happen now. He removes the blade as quick as he can, but the pain is downright the most excruciating thing she's ever experienced, and Marissa falls onto the concrete path on her back, breathing heavily, breathing in pain.

Her killer, the Career that has stabbed her in the gut, looms over her, but he's on his knees, pressing a hand against the side of her face. "I'm sorry Marissa, I told you I wouldn't let you do it again. I am sorry I am a keeper of my word..."

Marissa isn't sure anymore what is or what isn't a raindrop or a tear sliding down her cheek anymore, but all she knows is that Milor is with her in this moment of death, she weakly embracing the hand he holds out to her.

She looks straight up at the sky, and if she tries to get past the gloom of the storm, to try and picture the blue locked behind the prison gates of this rain, she can see that hill that she's wanted to go to, but she doesn't see that, she sees none of that. There isn't a roaring hill with lilac flowers, and hopping bunnies. There isn't even a black sky, a pitch black darkness with nothing... it's _worse._

The last thing she pictures, the last thing Marissa Herdier _hallucinates_ , is Colt's sneer, the disappointment he holds for her, at the sake of her humanity.

* * *

 ** _Persephone Castor: District 2 Female P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

"You doing alright?" she asks Milor, the two walking in silence through their quadrant of the arena. Persephone doesn't know what comes over her, the sudden drowsiness, but she asks Milor if they can make a quick pitstop, and the curls up against this dainty, quaint bench to only awake to the booming sound of cannon fire, and when she rights herself out of panic, hands going for her war hammer, the first thing she sees is her district partner kneeling down next to someone.

When she wanders over, she has to bow her head, as she recognizes the dying - _dead, Persephone,_ she has to remind herself, _dead -_ girl to be Marissa Herdier, the girl from District 9. In the best way Milor can try to talk about it, the girl came across her sleeping and was about to kill her, at which Persephone's mouth goes dry entirely. Perhaps this might be way Hale advocated for not letting her guard down, as insane shit like that nearly just happened.

"I'm okay," he nods, wiping off the dried blood onto his pant leg, but he's been doing it incessantly now, over and over trying to clean what isn't there. However, she doesn't say anything, as Persephone knows better than to get in the way of one of Milor's moods. They might be Careers, but the only thing they've killed is plastic dummies in their respective training centers, so fighting off another human being and ending their life is a different story entirely. She recalls seeing Milor only fend off Caiden at the Bloodbath, as she does likewise when caught in a blade tangle with Peri accidentally over some bag that she ends up forfeiting, since Persephone nearly loses a thumb over it, and there's probably something stupid in the bag anyway.

She wonders when she'll get her first kill, and that is an actual rather morbid thought that causes her to shudder. It has stopped raining, so it takes no part in the chills that slide down her spine and encircle her pelvic bones, freezing them solid and tight. They must be nearing the diamond obelisk by now, and besides the need to fall asleep, and some subsequent murder of another child, the trip has been rather uneventful.

Persephone runs a hand through her wet hair, clumps getting caught between her fingers. Something that Milor says to her, about Marissa's demise, haunts her to the core. The only reason, after her district partner extended this poor girl mercy, for turning around and trying to stab him in the back, is because she didn't want to once again be unable to prove herself from position of strength, but that is very much the extent of what he goes to tell her. But it is that odd motive... who has told Marissa she isn't strong? It must be the same voices in her own head, telling her that she isn't worthy, and it is Persephone gritting down on her teeth, biting into her lip with the razor sharp edge clutched in one hand pinning down pieces of tangible flesh, digging into them and writing in copper the words of her naysayers. Painful reminders.

A painful reminder that to survive past this ordeal of hers, this agony, to beat the voice in her head, she has to somehow get out of the arena alive, and over her district partner's dead body. A person that she is unable to not attach feelings to, platonically of course - Persephone likes to imagine that she'd be a good girlfriend to him if he didn't swing in the way of men, but lucky for Carrion she supposes - and that just might be her largest blockade. Not her self doubt. Not the inflicted self harming... but _Milor Drusus._

She looks at him again, probably like a puppy with the wet hair, the downcast expression, the solemn stare. "Are you sure?"

"Seph, if I really wasn't feeling good, I'd tell you, okay?" he places a hand on her shoulder.

Persephone gives a slight smile, hugging him tighter. An awkward silence pervades them for a minute, she taking a look around the arena, trying to forget the bodies and skeletons that they've been leaving behind in their wake. The part they're in has a bit more trees than the considered barren other sorts, and she wonders if either the trio of Valencia, Marcus, and Hero or Maisey and Carrion have run into any of their own problems. The only reason why Persephone wakes up from her nap due to the cannon fire is because of the proximity she is towards Marissa's body, a not very far distance, actually.

She didn't mean to fall asleep. Milor promises he'll tell the others that it had been a ruse to get tributes off their guard. Persephone doesn't want to lie, but to save face, she must.

However, the very next second, as she's about to open her mouth and make a comment on the trees, her feet go slipping on a wet, upturned piece of concrete, Milor's hands going out to grab her by the arm, but he misses and she is sliding down this massive hill, through the entrance of a building, and skidding to a stop on her butt... which _hurts._ Persephone shakes her head groggily, bringing a hand to her head. Ouch.

She seems to have skidded quite far into the room, having been distracted by the sudden expanse of trees, by the thought if the other serious Careers have made any fresh kills of the day, and now she's what seems to be hundreds of yards away from Milor. Persephone gets to her feet, still clutching onto her war hammer - she'd hate to be without her weapon now - and Milor's voice is getting louder and louder as he is seeming to be running down the hill after her.

"Seph, are you okay?"

"Yeah, I think I just slipped down the hill somehow..." she clutches her head. "I'll be lying if I said it didn't hurt though."

Persephone stumbles back a bit, disoriented from the tumble and bumble down the hill when she swears her eyes are deceiving her. Are... are those doors closing in on her? Her eyes widen, and she stumbles forward, running at them. "No, no, no, no, don't!" she shouts. Milor is just on the other side, about to reach her, when they slam shut, trapping her in. She pulls on the handle, but the door won't budge, and there's no way in President Calhoun's good graces she is going to be able pull it back open. "Milor!" she bangs on the door.

"Persephone!" he cries out, on the other side. Milor tries opening it as well, but comes to the same result. These doors aren't going to be able to budge. "Persephone, I can't get in!" the panic in his voice is almost endearing, if that is even a thought that is allowed to be normally thought of in this situation.

She closes her eyes, taking a deep breath. If it is some cruel trap by the Gamemakers, as a way to make sure she dies, Persephone is armed and she'll face the world of darkness. "I'll be fine. I'm gonna try and find a way out, okay?"

"I'm not going to leave from this spot," Milor says to her, and then, voice trembling after her, "Be careful, okay?"

"Don't worry about me," Persephone replies, righting herself away from the door, her body getting swept by another chill.

She turns around into the sea of blackness, she having skidded into some lobby. Looking down, the floor is an awkward tiled mess that alternates in gigantic squares of alternative purple, nearly eggplant color, and sickly vomit green. Groping around in the darkness that isn't covered in light that barely peeks through the crack underneath the bottom of the entrance doors, Persephone's arm collides with a rectangular solid that sends shockwaves up through the arm as she hits it with her funny bone.

Persephone curses, which is definitely not an action she does normally, as that is very un-ladylike, dropping her war hammer, it nearly landing on her feet, it colliding to the tile with a deafening crash. She freezes, squeezing one eye shut, her entire body tensing. Unfortunately for her, the Career from Two has no idea what she's gotten herself into, nor what may be in this building with her. Using her other hand, the one not currently walking off the strange sensation of nerves that shouldn't be touched that have been touched, her hands grasp onto the end of something cylindrical. Bringing to close to her face as well as she can, her eyes widen in elation.

A flashlight!

Until the senses return back to her hand that had hit the counter, she fumbles with finding her war hammer in the dark. After she is able to wiggle her fingers independently of each other and no longer feeling the paralysis keeping them from working, she turns the flashlight on, finding the war hammer - she keeps on kicking it over and over again - and Persephone picks her weapon. She's advanced herself again. Persephone flashes the light around the room, and whatever place she's stuck in has a rather high ceiling, and when she directs the flashlight to the sides of her, where she assumes that is where the walls will be, there's just the extension of the room, a nothingness that goes beyond what her own eyes are able to perceive.

She takes a step inwards and freezes again, as good god that echo is haunting. The very simple noise of her heels colliding with the tile making avalanches of sound waves that bounce off of the unseen walls. A bit further into her exploration, Persephone comes across a sign. It hangs above her head, teetering back and forth, loosely attached to a few threads of rope. Illuminated by the ghoulish white glow of the flashlight, written in what may be the Gamemakers trying to make something look like blood, is _House of Horrors._

Persephone snorts, and that is a sound she does not jump at it. _As if they're going to scare me with simple tricks and illusions._ She's a Career; the only thing she is scared of is the edge of a knife held in another bloodthirsty tribute's hand. She does grip onto the base of her hammer a bit tighter than normal, though, as she wades through the halls of this so called, 'House of Horror'. Persephone walks by boiling cauldrons of wax hands in a pot, stirred by some animatronic witch with a voice cackle that is two hundred years old at least. Or the row of rubber knives that stick out from the wall, and when she pokes her toe against it, the blade pushes in like candle wax, and then rebounds back into position.

This may just be the weakest thing she's ever seen the Gamemakers do. Somehow, through all of this she is also being filmed? Yeah, right.

However, when Persephone enters a section of the house, the 'Mirror Hallway', she immediately notices the temperature drop. The remainder of the house is rather heated, but this one is oddly colder than the rest, by a good fifteen or twenty degrees, enough to make her really feel the chill, even making her sneeze. The hall of mirrors is exactly that, equally lined up on both sides of her are mirrors, and when she looks into them, all she sees is her reflection.

Just her reflection. Nothing scary about it.

"Is that it?" Persephone laughs to herself, looking up at the high rise ceiling for some camera to give it all away. "You lock me in here away from my closest ally to try and get a good scare out of me? Well, you failed!"

She takes another step, looking to her left, and then she stops in her tracks, righting herself in front of the mirror she's stopped at. There is indeed another reflection of Persephone Castor in front of her, but she's clothed differently than she really is, this reflection, this doppelganger. Instead of the classic red and black tribute uniform, she's in a long, flowing black dress that stops at the shoulders, revealing the dark and sultry skin tone that Persephone is used to. The hair is identical, the bridge of her nose is correct, and the hands are even manicured correctly.

Persephone furrows her eyebrows together. This is so odd... what sort of conjurer's trick is this? "She looks just like me..." she whispers. Would this mean that if another tribute were to fall into this pit, this 'House of Horror', that there'd be so dummy lookalike in this same mirror. She isn't impressed. Leaning in, Persephone wonders if she can touch the reflection when the doppelganger opens her eyes.

The Careers swallows a scream, her breath expelling out in one go, as the reflection in the mirror staring back at her is no longer just some lookalike... it's a Bizzaro representation. Persephone's normal eyes are brown. What is staring back at her has dark, soulless abysses for eyes, a pit of nothingness. She backs away from this creepy reflection, raising the war hammer high, when...

"Welcome, Persephone. Welcome, _sister..._ " the mirror seems to say, and her blood turns to ice. The doppelganger's mouth didn't move, so how did...?

"I-" whatever Persephone wants to say is unable to come out.

"You should join me..."

"I don't want to..."

"It'll be fun," the not-Persephone says, and then she _steps_ out of the mirror.

Persephone screams, raising her war hammer high and swinging it straight at the demon from some other dimension. The hammer collides right into not-Persephone's temple, breaking the monster's head. She wrenches her weapon free, about to take another step away, when the head snaps back into place, the demon extends her hands, fingernails turning into talons, hands turning into claws, and the beast opens her mouth and shrieks.

The Career has never run as fast as she has in her entire life, sprinting off, not checking to make sure that this demon thing isn't following behind her. The walls are the same sickly color as the floor, everything looking the same, and when Persephone takes in a notice of her surroundings, they're all the same. The same damn mirror, and coming from it is her, _her,_ waves and waves of her, and Persephone screams the whole run.

An amber light begins to peal through one of the corners, and she dashes for it, when all of a sudden she notices that there's a masculine voice warping with hers, one totally foreign to any distortion that these villains might be expelling. Someone else is trapped in here with her, undergoing the same torment... this _is_ some sick Gamemaker trick! Persephone looks behind for a split second, and when she resumes back to the correct direction, she sees stars.

Headlong, Persephone collides with some other person in the dark, this time head first, and the pain is unbearable. She hits the tile, groaning out in pain, and whatever she hit does as well. While she gets her senses back, she looks in the direction in which she had come from. There is no ghoul chasing her, no other Persephone coming from terrifying mirror dimensions... so if she didn't collide with one of _her,_ then what did she hit...?

Her answer is another set of eyes looking back at her, emerald green, and then the notices the glint of metal hiding in the darkness. Another tribute. The guy who has been trapped inside the horror house with her. Amber hair... or is it black hair turned ginger due to the fact that there's an amber light cast around the room? It doesn't matter, as when they collided, their weapons went scattering across the floor. The room they're both in isn't pitch black anymore, but she doesn't have the greatest look at the guy.

They lock eyes, then back to their weapons, and back at each other.

Persephone lunges off of the ground towards her hammer, managing to grab it just by the very tip of the sharp horn, and she tries her hardest not to cry out in pain as her hand slices up the sharp edge of the hammer. The other tribute manages to snag her ankle, pulling her back, Persephone yelping and holding onto the other end of the hammer. Swinging it out, it just barely hits him, her opponent, and he lets go, bounding back onto his feet and grabbing his own weapon.

The amber light glints off of an axe blade, and her mouth goes dry. If this is Linden Hazel... she's dead. The voice however, sounds like Corvus Raynott, and Persephone has never been more confused in her life. Doesn't matter. She lets out a battle cry, lunging at him again, which the guy amply dodges, kicking his leg out and she goes tumbling back onto the floor. She barely recovers, flipping onto her back, when he goes diving, the axe blade catching onto the thickest part of the hammer. Had he connected any lower, she'd be dead right now.

She grunts in surprise at the sudden exertion of force, struggling to keep her arms up. He pushes down, seemingly somehow getting to where he is standing with bent knees, heels digging into the floor. It is the perfect motion of him moving back while exerting pressure on her hammer that gives Persephone the leeway to kick him away from her, she trying to get to her feet. He goes flying back a bit, but skidding on his feet with a dexterity and grace that not even Maisey or Valencia possess.

Persephone misses the trajectory of her leap back to her feet, slipping once more - the damn action that got her _into_ this mess - and she crashes onto the floor again, her head smacking against the tile. She sees stars, blots of red, and Persephone screams again as he dives at her with the axe again, as her hammer fell out of reach once more. She manages to grab the middle part of the axe handle, the blade a few inches from slicing a deep gash into her sternum. He rights himself in the light, and she tries to get another look at her assailant. Does he have ginger hair? Does he have black hair? She is so distracted by this little nuance that she nearly lets go of the handle, he digging down once more with a stronger exertion of force.

The Career grits her teeth together, expelling back with all her might at him, throwing him off of her again. This time it is he that collides onto the floor, and she gets to her feet. Persephone Castor is a Career, a _Career, dammit,_ first and foremost, and she did not fall asleep on a bench next to a dying girl due to her district partner keeping his word, or trip into a horror house and then get chased around by an evil doppelganger of herself to then run into another tribute years younger than her and _die_ by his hand. All this talk of whether or not she is worth becoming victor... none of that matters anymore, this damn traumatic experience has _proved that she will be the victor!_ He, whomever _he_ is, is still on his back, trying to recover from hitting his head, when Persephone wanders over to him, hammer in hand.

He cries out some sort of pitiful protest, but she doesn't want to hear it. His hands are probably outstretched, but she really can't see him all that well in the darkness, the room cast in amber light.

Persephone screams, lifting the war hammer up high, and bringing it down onto his face. There's the sickening crunch of his skull collapsing and indenting as she makes the hammer rise and fall over and over and over again, she having lost count of how many swings - probably around ten or eleven, at this point - and when she finishes, the tribute's face is a complete mess of blood, unable to be recognized even if Persephone tried her hardest. She isn't sure when the cannon must've gone off, but he's dead, and she's made it through this _fucking_ nightmare.

"Leave me alone!" she yells in an unrelenting fury, bringing the war hammer down one last time. "I am sick of not being good enough!" Persephone tosses the war hammer aside after the last stroke, her heart roaring in her chest, blood roaring in her ears, and the wall in front of her and the dead body seeming to pulsate along with the rest of the room.

She wants to collapse to her knees, as she's so exhausted, but a panel in the wall slides out, and she's greeted by sunlight and heat, and escapism.

Persephone runs back into the outside of the arena, crumbling to her knees the moment her shoes touch grass instead of tile, immediately starting to sob, and she is unable to even perceive when Milor's hands wrap around her body, she trembling in a hug...

Inside that house of horrors, she's experienced her rebirth.

Her revival.

Persephone Castor has transcended.

* * *

 **17th: Marissa Herdier, 17, District 9 Female. Killed by Milor Drusus of District 2. Created by Reader Castellan. Oh, Marissa, how I had great plans for you! I really enjoyed the amount of time I got with you, and in the end, you really have messed over Colt, Alexandra, and Rochelle, so who knows how that will go. However, as much as you were feisty and great to write, different from most outer tributes, you were one of those that has proven that you are just not able to go it alone in a lethal Quarter Quell arena, but I do think in your death you had a powerful character breakthrough, where unfortunately your new strides just couldn't save you in the end. Sadly, the second district we say goodbye to is District 9.**

 **16th: Corvus Raynott, 15, District 6 Male. Killed by Persephone Castor of District 2. Created by S.H Reke. Now, did you guys think I killed Linden instead of Corvus? I wanted the ambiguity. I will also mention that I really didn't have a plan for you, Corvus, which is unfortunate, as a lot of our fellow submitters have really valued their time spent with you. You were a joy to write, unwrapping the layers, going toe to toe with a Career and nearly winning, but losing Lowelle took out most of your fight. I hadn't planned this Persephone section until I just sat down to wrote it, and I have to say thank you, as this moment is my favorite section of the story, Persephone's trip inside the House of Horrors, unfortunately you were the victim I chose to have this happen. Sadly, we say goodbye to the third wiped out district of District 6. Rest and go in peace now, Corvus.**

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Marcus Pharadane** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ] / **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Persephone Castor** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

District 3: **Rochelle Pascal** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by santiago poncini20_ ] / **Maisey Rovneay** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ]

District 5: **Edwin Bishop** [ _Submitted by IciclePower33_ ] / **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon_ ] / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 10: **Hero Slade** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ] / **Alexandra Quinn** [ _Submitted by SparrowBirdEliza_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **This is one of those chapters where, when I finish, I just have to sit there and take it all in for a second at what I just wrote, this monstrous chapter that went for far too long that I had anticipated, but I am glad that it did, because dammit I am crying about it right now. Firstly, Marissa and Corvus are gone, meaning there is no more District 9, or 6, and both were killed by District 2 tributes... and we're now down to fifteen tributes left ladies and gentlemen, already at the end of Day 2...**

 **Beyond that, Colt, Alexandra, and Rochelle are supply-less thanks to Marissa betraying them, the Careers have split up for the time being, and Edwin has stumbled across the most beautiful of beautiful things.**

 **Now, you know I often like to ask you guys your opinions and such... and right now I would. For Persephone's end section, it went on a lot longer again than I anticipated - hell, I could've made it the entire chapter, but I didn't - and I would really love some feedback on it, positive, constructive, maybe even negative... because I don't think I've ever written character development quite like that before and I am really touched, not only by Persephone, but by Corvus's death, and the terror of the House, and I don't know where that side of my writing came from in quite some time.**

 **Beyond all of that, I hope you guys do review and make it through this terribly large chapter, as we are going to be at Day 3 of the games soon, but first another Capitol character chapter, which is Chapter #28: Bribery, Blackmail, and Betrayal... what could be brewing in the works? I wrote this entire chapter in quite some damn time, starting at 4:00 PM today, and it is now 2:52 AM at this ending AN (no, I did not write this chapter in one sitting, I'm not crazy), and that might mean the next chapter will be longer than a week wait, if you can manage.**

 **Extending that, I hope you all have an amazing day, and thanks for being amazing reviewers and submitters. I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	28. Blackmail and Betrayal (Capitol Plot VI)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #28: Bribery, Blackmail, and Betrayal. Three B's I am pretty sure you never want to see in a title, yeah? Last chapter was an arena chapter where a lot of things happened, namely Edwin came across a beautiful garden, Marissa was killed by Milor, and Persephone got caught in a house of horrors which she escaped by killing Corvus. I will say right now I apologize if updating speed is all funky and weird, as I have been feeling really under the weather the last week, so I am trying my best. Regardless, we're heading forward with our Capitol storyline, something you don't want to miss. Enjoy the chapter!**

* * *

 ** _Kevia Janelle: Victor of the 84th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

So this is what victor life has led to? Sitting outside and having lunch with Hale Cornerstone just must be the pinnacle of her career, right? Kevia finds it rather ironic, actually, how she has lunch with Hale at least once during the Games every year yet still finds herself complaining about it whenever it rolls around. No lie, when the victor rolls over in bed earlier in the morning, eyes opening up to her alarm clock and recognizing the date, the feeling in her stomach sours, as if she's come over with a sudden ache. Luckily for all of the other female victors from District 1, they don't have to join, as it seems to be, year after year, that Kevia is stuck mentoring with Lance while Hale rides up on the side, demanding for company.

It is too early - actually it is around noon, but for Kevia it is definitely way too early - to be dealing with the generally bubbly District 2 victor. The process is the same every time; Hale picks the place, sets the time, and Kevia stands there in the Viewing Center, stuck in an upright position like some plastic doll with a fake smile, shaking the woman's hand, and saying that she'll be there. She doesn't have a choice. Kevia sees the way the polls are going; Milor and Persephone are higher than Marcus and Valencia odds wise right now for possible victorship, actually winning by a landslide. The blonde has no idea why that is, at least for Valencia. She's tried making her girl as likable and charismatic as possible, but something about the District 2 charm has sucked the Capitol in.

Lance takes the blame for the terrible standings, as Valencia, despite having the highest training score, is _fifth_ in the odds standing, underneath Milor, Persephone, Linden, and Carrion, while Marcus is in tenth, but that's easy enough to deduce. The male from One is standoffish, clearly selfish, and the Capitol does not buy that up anymore. Authenticity oozes from every pore with the Hale and Ellison tag-team duo, tributes that are actually best friends and get along great. That is, above all, why she does not want to have lunch with Hale and try and discuss everything going on in the world, because she can bet Bonnie's emerald necklace that she still has that Hale is going to bring it up, just to rub it in. Just to have something to dangle over District 1's head.

Kevia finds herself sitting at some little coffee shop in one of the Capitol's downtown districts, up on a balcony overlooking a lake, shimmering blue water that is nearly as inviting as her salad being the only other company besides Hale. Lance is in the Viewing Center, and she'd give her left arm to be there right now, to watch the Careers split up on their different paths. Kevia clenches the table when Valencia expresses this strategy, her knuckles turning white as she's gripping the cloth unbelievably hard, as to the victor's mind, this is how the Careers were going to collapse, with seventeen tributes alive and not realizing they could've been heading into disaster. Her heart rate calms just a bit when her starlet to be elaborates further on the plan, noting in the notion of what could be contained as severance from the alliance, as leave it to Valencia to have everything worked out.

"So, what do you think about that?" Hale asks, interrupting Kevia's trail of thought.

She blinks, shaking her head, resting her fork on the side of her plate. The salad of greens, grape tomatoes, and some foreign cheese is alright - better than the conversation by far - and her thinking has acted as the only real distraction, so Kevia is grateful that Hale at least disrupts that.

"Think about what?" Kevia repeats the question, mentally kicking herself under the table. A victor is supposed to have the poise of a lynx in conversation with another of their kind, otherwise the fakery and the bullshit just drip off of every word she says, every action she performs, as if a rancid odor surrounds them and there's no way to remedy it.

"The fact that Carrion voted for Victoria. I thought we made them all swear that they wouldn't do that until it got near the end?"

She shrugs. "I don't know what you want me to tell you, Hale. He isn't my tribute," Kevia stabs at another piece of lettuce. "If Hector wants to get mad at District 4 for that, he can be my guest," her teeth are stained by the bitter vinaigrette. "However, if you want to help me pick my brain, I'd like to know why Valencia voted for Colt Sheppard of all people. The guy is sitting at eleventh in terms of the odds of winning, so why she didn't go for someone higher is confusing me," Kevia chews on the inside of her cheek. "I thought Valencia was smarter than that."

Perhaps there is a strategy to all of it that she just isn't seeing, but it doesn't matter. Kevia's not in the arena so she really doesn't have to worry about it, there's only so much she can do while sitting on one side of a screen, begging people to save her tribute's life. Part of her doesn't even care anymore, actually. It is a simple process of going through the motions, as it has been quite some time since a Career has brought home a win, let alone that win hailing from District 1. After a certain point, Kevia feels the bullets entering her skin, the barbs and insults, the losses... yet there's no sensory receptors bringing the pain to her head, she just lets it happen.

"Hector and Arizona weren't very happy about it," Hale comments, removing a piece of basil off of her teeth. She has a massive bowl of pasta in front of her, twirling it away with her fork, stuffing bite after bite into her mouth. Kevia raises an eyebrow, noting the way she says the latter victor's name. Keeping a steady eye on Hale's right hand, the victor's fingers clench at the mentioning of Arizona, her mouth hard pressed into a firm line, as if she is registering and washing in the disappointment as well. It wouldn't make sense... Persephone and Hero are in direct competition with one another. Why should it matter who votes for who, truly? It shouldn't, but it clearly is getting to someone, if not everyone else.

"It was their idea to have outsiders in the Careers," Kevia points out, picking up her fork and jabbing it in the victor's direction. "And actually, it was you who fought hard for them to get in there. What do they have to show for it? A zero kill record, and now one half is dead, the other _happy_ that the death happened."

"You don't need to remind me," Hale mutters into her pasta bowl.

Kevia smirks, taking another bite of her salad. She's been known to be the one always stirring the pot, and there's nothing better than keeping her title up. Once more, the victor sets her fork down. "How's Arizona?"

Hale freezes, eyes averting over to the water. Kevia follows the gaze, keeping her face as friendly as possible. The other woman's eyes give a lot more away than perhaps what she thinks she is revealing, a tunnel shooting out fear, terror, fright, and other synonyms that prove Hale has been caught red-handed in something; no name, not even Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis's, is enough to scare someone as if they've seen a ghost. Kevia survived an arena with Kevia as the Head Gamemaker, so she's already endured the very worst.

"Why do you ask?"

"No reason," Kevia shrugs. "He seemed upset last night."

"Apparently he and Hector got into an argument."

"About what?"

"Why does it matter what they argued about?" Hale snaps, looking up at Kevia. _Aha._ Just the reaction she needed, just the reaction she _wanted._ How easy it is for her to mold someone else like the clay they are. How easy it is to get the results she desires, simply by prodding on the buttons one too many times, like a bag already bursting at the seams, the sides rotting away, melting away, and it is glorious, it is glorious watching the fireworks take place. "I have no idea what transpired between them. I'm not Arizona's keeper."

Kevia places her hands up in a ' _I surrender_ ' deal, exhaling through her nose. District 2 is always so quick to anger, they always have been. Something impossible for Hale to keep under check, she's noticed, as the slightest perturbance manages to set off either her panic mode, which Kevia has been the hilarious witness to once or twice, or the enraged assault mode, with snarling faces and hostile tones of the voice. And once again, with even the slightest spurring, they're off to the races.

"You don't have to get upset at me, Hale. I'm just asking a question."

"You are-" Hale opens her mouth to rebuttal, picking up her fork to take another bite, but something causes her to stop talking, locking her jaw. She sets her fork down, pushes her chair back and stands up, Kevia watching all of this in silence. "Never mind, Kevia. I'm not hungry anymore." Hale picks up her jacket, slinging it over her shoulder. "I'll see you back at the Viewing Center; I'm going to go check on Persephone and the others."

Getting run out like the rat she is, Kevia finds the surrender almost humorous. She watches as Hale bids a hasty retreat from the café, leaving her unfinished plate of pasta behind, as if she is ever going to miss it. Perhaps she didn't have to be so nose on the whole thing, but truth be told, Kevia has never really gotten along with Hale at that well. Something sits wrong in her stomach looking at the other woman, perhaps it being with the fact that Hale just seems to sidestep over rules and protocols without having a care in the world.

Unlike Kevia, who abides by the Capitol laws and sanctions put in place, Hale struts out in the world like she owns the place, when all she did is stab a few tributes in the heart with a blade and win some Hunger Games. She isn't ruling the country, having people scream at her name. It is rather ironic, actually, Kevia finds, that Hale is more terrified of Ellison's stern warnings and lectures than of Calhoun's mighty hand. She'll be the bullshitting the system if anyone actually is afraid of the president himself, as it is rather the entire structure of the government that is scary, not just one individual person.

Her salad is no longer all that appetizing, and she might as well go and save Lance from watching the arena alone with nothing better to do, as Ellison spends most of his time sleeping anyways. Hale will be too pissed off to do anything else than brew in her own feelings, so Kevia sets her fork down, pushing the salad to one side, about to get up.

"No need to do that, Kevia; I was waiting to sit here anyways," says another voice, one that makes the victor from District 1 freeze in place, one hand gripping onto the edge of the table, the other pushing back her chair. A voice that Kevia has not heard speak to her in quite some time, and strong enough to make her freeze like that. Kevia looks up, into the gentle, yet razor sharp gaze of Bonnie Calhoun, the president's wife, the designer of the mutts, and honestly the last person she wants to be seeing right now. "Don't need to get up."

Kevia swallows the fear she had no idea she'd been holding. "Good- good afternoon, Bonnie, Hale and I were just having lunch and-"

"You don't have to lie to me," Bonnie admonishes, sitting down in Hale's unoccupied seat. "I know you hate her and just do this for niceties. Am I right or am I wrong?"

She locks her jaw. "Right."

All of her warning systems are going off in her head. What has she done recently to warrant the attention of perhaps the second scariest person in Panem? It is debatable whether or not Lewlyn would constitute as the scariest person or not, as she's seen those dosages of insanity over and over again and does not want to interact with the Head Gamemaker with a ten foot pole. It is rather ironic, Kevia finds, as Lance is scared of Calhoun instead, trusting the system to screw him over if he ever steps out of line, but the female victor knows differently. If there is anything political that needs to happen in the Capitol, chances are that Bonnie is the one who sets the gears in motion. Calhoun simply writes them into law; Kevia has seen the dynamic over and over again thousands of times, at thousands of instances.

Bonnie pushes Hale's unfinished plate of pasta to the side, seemingly rather serene and smug. For what reason, however, Kevia is unsure of. "How are you holding up?" she asks the victor, which would perhaps be the strangest question of them all to ask. As far as Kevia is aware, her facial expressions over the last few days have been fairly neutral. So far, the only scare has been Valencia nearly dying to that District 9 boy, Blake, but Lance tells her privately that Marcus has a strange sense of loyalty, and that loyalty makes any self-interest conflicting.

"I'm fine. How are you?"

"I am doing pretty good," the president's wife admits, but then there's a slight pause, like the turning of the head, eyes glancing upwards, and Kevia's blood turns to ice. "Well, I _was_ doing pretty good today, but something soured my mood."

Kevia's mouth dries up immediately, and when she swallows, her Adam's apple is as coarse as a rock in her throat. "Oh? What's wrong?"

Bonnie runs a hand through her hair, blonde waves tied back into a ponytail, strands flowing through the gaps between her fingers. "Well, Calhoun and I are hosting dinner tonight for one of the new Gamemakers, which naturally means all of the Gamemakers are invited, and of course, since it is a social event, I like to dress up," and the woman rests one of her hands up against her neck, where a necklace would go, her fingers encircling around nothing, where what would normally be there has to be something else... a voidance. Kevia's blood warms back up, but this time it is heart that begins to turn cold. "And I noticed, when I was checking my outfits and matching accessories, that my emerald necklace was missing. You know which one I'm talking about, right?"

"Yeah. You're uh... your- your mother gave it to you."

"Close," Bonnie says, blinking, tilting her head to stare at the victor, her mouth unmoving, stuck in a straight line, as cold faced as she could get. "I inherited it after she passed away awhile ago," and she uses the other hand, the one not clutched at her throat, to tap on the table, fingers getting dangerously close to the handle of the knife stuck in the pasta bowl. Kevia's eyes dart to the knife blade, and back at Bonnie, who also watches said movement. "So, I decided to search my room and see if I could find it somewhere, because I might've misplaced it. In my haste, I knocked over a photo album sitting on my dresser, and because I have all the time in the world to kill, I went through it. Any idea what that photo album contained pictures of?"

"No idea," Kevia shrugs, shaking her head back and forth. Eyes again go back to the knife. Perhaps... if she's just a bit faster on the draw than what Bonnie expects, she could send the knife through the neck, slice an artery, and get out of the Capitol in time, fast enough before no one would notice.

"The pictures of last year's victory tour," Bonnie smiles. "Everyone who is anyone was there, I'm sure you remember! And I came across this photo of you, Lance, Hale, Arizona, Hector, and a few others that I don't think I ever saw before..." the tapping starts to become more noticeable, louder and louder each few repetitions. "It was the back at the book, as if someone wanted no one to look at it," she lifts one of the corners of her mouth up in a partial smirk. "You were in the middle of the picture, and you know what I noticed?"

"What?"

"My necklace. Around your throat." Bonnie sits up, crossing her hands together, resting them on the table. Wherever her hands are, doesn't matter now, they're away from the knife. "Tell me, Kevia," she clears her throat, eyes flashing a dangerous and luminous steel. "Why was there a picture of you wearing my mother's emerald necklace here at a Capitol party? I am pretty sure I never gave you permission to wear it; my mother didn't leave it for you to inherit, so why were you wearing it?"

"There's a logical explanation for everything, and-" Kevia starts to say, but she knows better, _dammit she knows better._

"You stole it from me, Kevia," Bonnie interrupts. "Cut the bullshit. You're better than that, and you're smarter than that."

The victor thinks back to just a couple of weeks ago on the day before the reaping, when she walks into Lance's home and sees the dead lamb in the kitchen, blood all over the counter, he naked - she shudders at the fact that he's naked, but that's a different demon for a different day - and she is wearing the same damn necklace actually, flaunting it around the district without a care in the world. Kevia remembers seeing Bonnie wear said necklace for the first time, back when she used to sit with Calhoun during the tribute parade and wave to the crowd - it hasn't always been that the president has a wife during his term, as there is nothing that points to Coriolanus having a wife after a certain point - that one of the spotlights catches just right onto it and Kevia's mouth drops open; the piece of jewelry is fabulous and she _must_ have it.

That has been her MO since whenever she could remember, as young and as far back as she could go. Obtaining the things that were never hers, trying to get the things she could never have.

Just how stupid did she have to be, though, to wear the president's wife's necklace to a Capitol outing? Kevia massages her temples, even though Bonnie is most definitely still talking.

"Yeah. You're right. I did," there's no point in lying, and she's never been all that exceptional of a liar. "I did."

"Where it is? Did you bring it with you? Were you going to wear it again for something else?"

"It's probably back in District 1," Kevia pinches the bridge of her nose. "I wore it for the reapings and changed it immediately, as I dressed way too fancily for a reaping."

Bonnie gets even closer to the victor, grabbing her wrist and pulling her right arm forward, clenching the hand with her own, squeezing, a squeeze hard enough to remind Kevia of pain she has not felt in some time, not since the District 8 girl speared her through the leg with a fire poker, as her arena had been in a mansion that spawned several acres. "I want my necklace here, Kevia, by tomorrow morning on my desk in the Gamemaker Center or else." Bonnie does not need to go in detail on what 'else' could entail, as she always will picture the worst.

The _very_ worst.

Kevia nods. "Yeah, I uh- I can do that."

The president's wife stands up, crossing her arms. She goes to walk away, turns side face somewhat, and then makes her way back to the table. "I was thinking of telling Calhoun about you stealing the necklace, but on my way over here I decided against it," Kevia takes a deep breath, almost sighing in relief. Even while Bonnie is terrifying in her own right, and often than not the president hardly holds a flame in fright to her, whenever it comes to his wife, there's no transgression higher than that in which he loses his cool. Kevia is talking about people disappearing for a few days and coming back changed men, the loss of limbs, familial ties being separated, and even the ending of lives over the disrespect of Bonnie Rodney, so she's sure stealing isn't something to be crossed off that list, with something as precious as a family heirloom. "However, I kinda like there being consequences to actions," she laughs. "It seems like people in the Capitol forget that. Besides, who's to say this isn't the first time you stole from my husband and I, but just the first time I caught you? Who's to say you won't try and steal again?" Bonnie shakes her head, making a sad face. "So, I am actually going to tell him, Kevia. Anything you can say to convince me otherwise?"

The victor gives her a frightened look, all of a sudden feeling like she's eleven, staring down the bully in the Career academy who is the clear cut winner to become the new District 1 favorite at the age of eighteen, telling her that she's worthless and that she'll never amount to anything. When that girl breaks her leg trying a gymnastic trick and is out of the running, Kevia steps up, but when she's getting spat on by the piece of trash, she stands there and takes it, for being so small... it is the same exact scenario fast forwarded twenty-five years.

She's got nothing. If she's never been a good liar, then how can she come up with something on the spot?

Kevia stays silent, Bonnie raises her eyebrows, shakes her head, and begins to walk away. Quickly, the victor's eyes flash over to the knife still sitting in Hale's abandoned pasta bowl. However, she isn't thinking about using the knife as a weapon... but rather _Hale._ Her eyes widen, her heart skips a beat, and Kevia goes down a path of no return.

"Actually, I do," Kevia calls back, getting to her feet, stopping Bonnie in her tracks, who had nearly gotten to the exit door of the café. The president's wife turns around, face slightly amused. _Do your worst. Entertain me._ "I know something you don't."

That is good enough to spur Bonnie's attention, and her heels echo into the open air as she walks back to the table, trying to not give too much away, but it might not be that easy. She sits back down in the empty seat, her hands going back to folding over one another. "I'm all ears, Kevia. You know something I don't? That's very rare."

A game of bribery, blackmail, and betrayal, done by the very best, the best of the best.


	29. For Whom the Bells Toll (Day 3)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #29: For Whom the Bells Toll, and boy, we're here for another arena chapter, and I just love writing these. Last arena chapter was pretty momentous, as we lost Marissa and Corvus to the fated District 2 Career pair, and now we're down to fifteen tributes on day three - I like fast paced Games, ya'll, sorry - and things are afoot in the Capitol, but we'll be back there for a later time... as today is Day 3 of the Quarter Quell, and the board is about to move very fast, so hold on tight. Enjoy Chapter #29: For Whom the Bells Toll.**

* * *

 ** _Marcus Pharadane: District 1 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

The arena is starting to weigh on his shoulders. He can feel it with every labored breath that he takes, breathing in dust and ash and pollen into his lungs, exhaling out breaths that are consumed with sulfur, riddled with the scent of death. The odor of failure mingles after it, but he is trying not to think about it. The echoing of cannon fire rings in his ears, a drumming that will not go away. Coolness is around him, where usually Marcus feels at peace, a calming sort of sensation, but this coolness makes the hair on his arms stand up straight, as if he is being watched. Ever since it rained yesterday, things have felt different, a strange new aura that settles over the arena like a blanket, a thick blanket where he cannot see where he is heading.

A seven strong Career pack that disembarked from the Cornucopia way too early into the Games for his liking - Marcus would say something, but since he's been dancing on thin ice for the longest time with most of them, as he's seen the dodgy looks from Maisey, Carrion, and Milor to feel self-conscious, he stays silent - and there is no way to convince Valencia otherwise, she headstrong in her conviction and belief that the Careers need to change things up a bit, and that is no longer holding up in the Cornucopia. Besides, as his district partner rationales, there isn't another alliance as large as theirs where taking that much space would be beneficial to them in covering a wide area. He does not know for Maisey and Carrion if their section of the arena that they cover before reaching the obelisk structure is eventful, and theirs wasn't any different. Hero and Valencia chat some, he stands back a bit, bow drawn, always ready to fire.

However, when they reach the obelisk last, since Valencia gets them going in a circle without even realizing it, and discover Persephone wailing in Milor's arms, Maisey trying her hardest to calm the other girl down, Marcus's heart swells in his throat. Only so much could've happened for her to bawl like this, as she's seemingly been the most stalwart emotionally. In the blubbered mess that is Persephone's story, it is deduced that she's locked away in some house of horrors, chased by a mutt of some kind, and she dueled a kid, killing him. Milor tells of the death of Marissa, the girl from Nine, and it hits Marcus that two Careers, their names ironically both starting with the letter 'M', killed District 9.

Whoops.

When the faces shine in the sky, and the other face to show up is Corvus Raynott, the likes of which scored as good as Maisey, Persephone has to excuse herself for a moment, needing to take a breather. Valencia joins her instead of Maisey, the girl passed out and snoring, which keeps everyone awake, but what Marcus focuses on is his own emotional state.

The numbness of it all.

He's killed someone, yet he hasn't truly thought about it all that much, and it has been two days since the Cornucopia, two days he last fired that bow and arrow at Blake to save his district partner's life. She thanks him whenever she gets a chance to, but beyond that he hasn't dwelled too long on the fact. What has stuck with Marcus, when he does have the shot pass his thoughts every once in awhile - he closes his eyes after firing the arrow, he doesn't see it land, but he knows it does since Valencia's here and Blake isn't - that somehow, the qualms about him not wanting to kill aren't really there anymore.

Marcus has done it once, and now he thinks he'll be able to do it again when the time is right.

At the time being, the day has seemed to shift into a lull, where the Careers have now set up their new basecamp under the obelisk structure, it being a tower about fifty or so feet, Carrion ganders, made of a precious gemstone that Marcus is unable to determine. The obelisk glows blue in the sunlight, a rather delightful turquoise, like a diverting wave, and a ferocious sunburst orange at night. Whenever he rests his head up against one of the pillars, his head gets warm all of a sudden, when it is dark out, and he looks at the obelisk strangely. Marcus has probably experienced weirder, but whatever.

Valencia and Carrion are sparring while Milor cheers them on, and yet again Maisey is off sleeping. Marcus watches the two fight with an awed curiosity, but part of it irks him. He does not know where this camaraderie feel comes from. Everyone in the Careers know that only one of them can win. He is able to be nice, to be cordial, but to be _friends?_ Marcus just cannot shake that strangeness out of his head, as he watches Valencia trip and crash into Carrion accidentally, both of them falling onto the concrete and laughing their heads off. Milor helps his boyfriend up, giving him a quick peck, and that makes Marcus even more confused. He saw them both naked in bed together, knowing obviously what that meant, but it still getting ridiculous. What are the two of them going to do when they're the final two, after sleeping together a couple of times? What then?

He is going to wash down his arrows again, going over to his bag and picking up the same washed out rag and his quiver. Marcus doesn't really know why he does this so often, but whenever there's a quiet period happening, he'll pick up his bow, sling the quiver over his shoulder, wet a rag found in one of the backpacks and get to cleaning the arrow shafts. He finally managed to get the blood off of one of them, the one that had found Blake's neck, which is what he had been cleaning when Valencia spoke to him on the first night, but something in him has to do it... otherwise he isn't complete.

Marcus plops back at his spot, and Valencia tags out to where it is Milor fighting Carrion, but he only pays half attention to the spar. He's rather stuck thinking on last night, as he glances over to the side of the obelisk closest to him, is Hero, leaning up against the stone structure, arms crossed, eyes narrowed in like a viper's at the two dueling Careers.

The air is smoky, Marcus smells smoke on the air, everyone else is asleep, and he's taking watch for the camp when gravel crunches behind him and he turns, loading an arrow at the noise.

Hero jumps, raising his hands in self-defense, making a small smile. Marcus lowers the bow, tilting his head somewhat. The male from District 10 makes his way over, sitting side by side with Marcus, crossing his legs.

"Next time you want to speak to one of us," Marcus says, setting the arrow back into his quiver, "Don't sneak around. I could've shot you and that could've ended terribly."

"Got it," Hero says back, nodding his head.

Marcus doesn't know what to really think of the little guy, when in height comparison he is much shorter. Marcus relates Hero to be like a rock that tried getting thrown across a lake, to skip the water and bounce over the aqua surface, only to break halfway through the run, floating, but not sinking. Nothing tethers him to the group; just an alliance by Milor's behest, and even that itself is weak. Without Victoria, everything that made Hero glimmer and looking presentable is gone. Valencia originally didn't want Hero, even after Persephone makes the hard-pressed argument on the first day of training. She saw the way he fought, which while well, required his district partner by his side. The reason the two were so lethal is because they worked together and fought together for years; their synergy had been off the charts. However, with Victoria now dead to the world, Marcus felt the chains break somewhat, and that the little male from District 10 is on some sort of life raft, holding to a piece of rope that tears itself apart by the second, with every waking breath.

"You can't sleep?" Marcus asks.

"No."

"Nightmares?"

"Not really." Hero shrugs, turning his head. Marcus opens his mouth to ask if he wishes to divulge further, but he doesn't need to, as the other Career goes ahead and does it for him. "I- I- just..." he rubs his arm, "Every time I try and close my eyes, I can't get the image of her last look at me out of my head."

"Who?"

"Victoria."

Part of the Career's heart sinks. Even if he is not in the Hunger Games to make friends with anyone, there can still be something said to sharing in people's problems. Marcus didn't vote for Victoria, he voted for Rochelle, the girl from District 3. It is perhaps one of the strangest decisions he's made in his life, but he put himself in a more humane position, a place from morality that the intelligent, glasses wearing girl would more likely die from a Career killing her than anything else, and voting her out of the arena to die in some other way would perhaps be more peaceful, but it didn't matter, as Victoria's vote had been overwhelmingly higher, three more than the next, which had been Valencia. If Marcus voted his true consciousness, he probably would've put one down for either Colt or Caiden, two enigmas in the grand scheme of things, both with decent scores, and both guys being larger than he is, which can turn any which way of a fight.

"I'm sorry," Marcus places a hand on the kid's shoulder, and he means it when he says it. Even if the rest of the pack wants to ostracize him for thinking ahead, for not being able to trust him, maybe Hero could be different, a duo that could conquer the arena, and when the time is right, he'd send an arrow into the kid's brain as a mercy kill. "I didn't vote for her, just so you know."

"Thank you," Hero says, looking at Marcus, giving another small rise out of his lip. He tilts his head back, the other Career having lowered his hand. "Just... the look of fright and terror on her face. I've never seen Victoria so scared in my life, and nothing ever scared her," Hero snaps his head back into place, shaking it, turning one hand into a fist. "She looked betrayed... and the last thing I said to her was that I thought she deserved it. For disregarding my feelings..." he scoffs. "I'm so stupid. Of course she was going to disregard my feelings. Only one of us could go home!"

Part of Marcus feels horrible for intruding on the subject, but his fellow ally came to him to speak, not to anyone else, and he very well could tackle this issue by himself, so something compels Hero to step forward and wear his heart on his sleeve. "Did you love her, Hero? Really love her?"

It takes a few seconds for him to reply, as if he still has to think about it. What harm could her ghost do to him that he hasn't now already done to himself? "I thought I did," he says. "I like to think I did... but when she said she couldn't date me, my entire world shattered, Marcus."

"You're young," Marcus says. "And if you do get out of this arena, you'll definitely find love. You'll move on." _Great pep talk, kid. Great pep talk. And the kid might get out of the arena? The kid isn't going to be able to find himself out of a hedge maze, let alone the arena. Don't delude yourself._

"And what if I don't want to?"

"Don't want to what?" Marcus is able to say confidently that no one has snagged his heart. There's no one in District 1 that is enamoring for his return - family not withstanding, of course - so he does not have that angle to play and toy with the Capitol's heartstrings like he'd want to. He sees how Milor and Carrion interact, the way they stick together like glue, the way their lips lock together in a kiss, and part of him is jealous, as he just thinks back to the Tribute Parade and how he thought somehow that he'd be able to manipulate Milor by smacking his butt one too many times and giving him seductive looks over the archery range.

"Move on..." Hero's voice is barely above a whisper.

"No one says you can't. You're perfectly okay do that as well."

Marcus looks up, shaking his head, hands pausing, the rag bunched up in his fingers. Milor and Carrion just finished their spar, Hero clapping his hands - battle must've been impressive - and the memory of he and Marcus's conversation last night dissipates. However, and this is what disrupts his flow of thought, is if anyone hears what he hears? He turns around, twisting his body, dropping the rag and picking up the bow.

Out on the air, there's a noise. It doesn't sound malicious, nothing to make the hair on his arms stand up still, but a noise all the same. It seems like the rest of the alliance is too caught up in their conversation to notice, but Marcus hears it clear as day. A monotonous beeping, rolling over and over again in his head, bouncing off of the brick walls. He stands up, shouldering his quiver, holding the bow down by his waist.

Giving another glance at the rest of his alliance, who do not seem to have any idea for their surroundings, Marcus walks off in the direction of the noise. Given its intensity, it seems very close, and all Marcus has to do is round one side of the obelisk. It gets louder and louder when he passes around another corner, at which this point the Career is directly on the other side of the structure, obscured from view. If any of the others were to look at him now, they wouldn't be able to see where he went, and that would surely cause some problems.

It is a silver box, and attached to the box, is a long piece of string connected to a parachute. Marcus raises an eyebrow. It's a sponsor gift. _Oh._

Placing his bow aside, he picks up the box. It's rather heavy, that he isn't expecting, which causes him to nearly drop it. Opening a few of the flaps, exposing the inside, Marcus reaches into it, his fingers hitting something solid, and seemingly square. The object is indeed heavier than what he anticipates, but all he does when he sees what it is raise his eyebrows again.

The object is a console of some sort, he's pretty certain, it being the same color as the box it came in. It is about the length of his forearm, not very wide, and on it is a range of buttons, with a word written on a piece of tape above it. At the far end of the console, by his hand, is a speaker, without any sort of identification. A few of the words written on the pieces of tape read, _Explosion, Monster, Rainfall, Dialogue, Wind,_ and a few others.

Marcus looks down at the now empty box. Is this a sound system? He's certain, but doesn't want to test it this second, that if he presses one of the buttons, the resounding noise in some capacity is going to emit from the speaker. What good would this do him? Is it even his? Marcus wasn't expecting a sponsor gift. At the bottom of the box is a tag, in which he sets the sponsor gift down and picks the tag up instead.

 _Hero, this is a gift from Hector and I, and we made sure to spend every single cent we had on it. We know you'll find a right place and time to use this, since you're a smart guy. It is a sound system, with a few different noises. Use it how you wish._

 _From,_

 _Arizona Merviere_

It belongs to Hero... it isn't _his_ sponsor gift.

Marcus looks around, trying to listen to the air. The minimal, due to his location, jubilance of the rest of the Career pack is still on the air, so it doesn't seem like anyone notices that he's gone. Unfortunately for Hero, there's no way he's getting his sponsor gift now. Marcus shoves it into his backpack, placing it in the largest pouch. No one touches his backpack lest they want to lose the hand that lands on a zipper.

The air noticeably seems to get colder, and thicker at the same time, Marcus sucking in a breath.

What the rest of the Careers don't know, won't hurt them.

* * *

 ** _Edwin Bishop: District 5 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

 _Waves crash off of a gentle shore. A moon, but not the one he's known his entire life, hovers in the sky, but it isn't the general white that Edwin has seen forever and ever either. It's surface glimmers like that of a fresh nickel clinking onto the sidewalk, craters seen from such a far distance, and around the rocky terrestrial body, a halo of angelic white, one where he can feel the radiance and beauty pass over him. A space version of Artemis._

 _He looks at the waves with an awed fascination, he standing barefoot at the shore, feet firmly planted in the cold sand, granules passing over his toes and underneath his toenails, but the feeling isn't at all unpleasant, but rather a calming of sorts. There's a breeze, which has a faint saltiness with it, as he tastes just a morsel on his tongue whenever he opens his mouth to take a breath. His shoulders rise and fall with the inhaling of the air, and it seems that the moon rises in the air and lowers as well mirroring his movements._

 _Edwin brushes a strand of his hair behind his ears, looking down at his body. He is dressed finely in an elegant suit, something he's never worn in his entire life; a piece of an abyss tossed onto his body, folds of dark leather, a rose in the lapel, fragile cardinal petals and thorns that slice and jab. The boy pulls the rose out of the lapel, looking at it from a distance, then bringing the flower closer to him. The stem is icy cold to the touch, something that should bring him alarm, but he doesn't really even think about it. There are ice wedges in the leaves, little tributaries that dash out and collect at the tips, droplets of dew colliding with the sand._

 _The rose returns to its original position, Edwin stuffs his hands inside his pockets, and begins taking a walk down the beach._

 _The roaring of the waves is music to his ears, a euphoric crash that mirrors a thunderclap. Glancing at the water, it almost seems crystalline, as it slams into the sand at forceful speeds, breaking apart and raining down onto the ground like shards of ice, a frigid blue sheet that glitters underneath the silver moon's glow. Edwin knows that if he takes a step into the water, he'll never be allowed to return, he'll never be able to go back home and back to his district. He'll never be able to fight another tribute in the arena like he'd want to._

 _Somewhere down the walk, Edwin stops, his attention now turned parallel to the ocean, focused in straight ahead along the shoreline._

 _She awaits. The fair maiden cloaked in ivory._

 _He approaches her timidly, at an arm's length distance, but enough to be close up and get a good look. She's downright beautiful, a paragon of extraordinary brilliance, her hair long and down to mid-back, a daisy stuck by her ear. She looks at him, and his heart stops. A gorgeous diamond stare rivets through him like a bullet lost haphazardly to ricochet, her eyes a luminescent and liquidous, a fresh raindrop splattering onto the soil._

 _"Annabellina..." he breathes._

 _His district partner doesn't say anything, instead she faces front, staring at the waves, staring up at the silver moon, and ignoring him. He grabs the rose again, holding it out so she can take it. He's offering it to her, yet she doesn't seem to get it; she doesn't understand. Annabellina is silent, and she then takes a step forward, and the rose in Edwin's hand seems to curl in on itself, the petal closest to her arm curling inwards, as if it is hissing. He recoils slightly as well._

 _He says her name again, but this time the syllables are hardly vocal enough for her to hear them over the cacophony of the shoreline. She takes another step forward, and the rose turns into ash in his hand. Edwin cries out in pain, as the falling away flower suddenly changes temperature, and the iciness he once felt is a searing pain that shoots upwards through his arm. He watches in horror as the petals turn to dust, blowing away in the breeze._

 _Annabellina is a woman in white, a gilded ivory dress with a cut at one of the legs, the back of her dress flowing behind her. A truly beautiful sight, but now she's heading towards the ocean. He shakes his head, trying to walk after her, but for every step he takes, it seems she is taking a thousand. His feet feel like they're tied to cinderblocks, and now he's simply digging holes in the sand with his heels, whenever he tries to take another step._

 _"Annabellina, wait! Don't do it!" he yells at her, but his desperate pleas fall unnoticed on deaf ears._

 _She doesn't even have the decency to look back at him. Annabellina reaches the water's edge, a wave passing over her foot, and the color flips. Edwin's next call of her name stops in his throat, as the wave passing over his district partner's foot doesn't hit the beach as the delicate and delightful icy blue, but a ferocious cardinal, scarlet droplets that sizzle on the sidewalk._

 _The water is now up to her waist, she wading in and it looks like she isn't going to stop. Edwin is still trying to pursue her, desperately now clawing at the ground, and the sand blows away, unable for him to get a grip on anything. The ocean is turning a blood red color, the moon's illustrious silver glow no longer comforting. He can only, just barely see the glimmer of her ivory dress now, Annabellina having waded out that far._

 _Something releases him, and Edwin leaps forward, taking a jump from his perch in the sand to the shore, bare feet hitting moist ground. However, his foot touches the edge of the ocean, the now crimson water, and his entire body screams._

 _He's on fire, internally. Edwin howls, falling back onto the sand, and he clutches his knee to his chest, trying to not think about the immense pain._

 _His skin feels like brittle glass, as if someone is pouring molten lava over his body._

 _All of a sudden, a piercing female voice is heard over the siren song of the beach, a feminine wail. Annabellina's voice._

 _Edwin sees a white hot flash, a supernova of tremendous proportions, and then his line of sight goes dark._

 _The beach explodes._

…

"Annabellina!" Edwin screams, launching himself upright.

His breathing returns to him immediately, he clenching onto the armrest of the bench, sitting up straight. The boy from District 5 shakes his head groggily, clutching his forehead with a hand, squeezing his eyes shut. When he opens them again, he places his hands over his body, down his legs, rubbing over his feet, and caressing his face. He's fine. He's not on fire. He isn't dressed in some suit, and there's no rose anywhere on him.

A nightmare.

Nothing more.

Edwin wipes at his forehead. He's still in the arena's botanical garden, the flowing place that matches his every movement. The fountain is trickling water still, and the ivy stalks grow long alongside the wall. Digging into his pocket, he pulls out the sapphire one of the flowers had given him. He remembers laying down, the butterfly with the see-through glass wings resting on his head, and then nothing. Has he been asleep for that long?

Momentarily, panic washes over him, he taking a deep breath. How could it be possible that he slept nearly twenty hours without waking up? Edwin gets to his feet, shaking his body over and over again, rubbing at his eyes. He can't get what he saw out of his head, what he dreamt. He and Annabellina on a beach, dressed beautifully... and she drowning herself, where the water turns to the color of blood... a sudden chill passes over him, and Edwin rubs his exposed arms.

He goes to sit down, to pull out the map and look where to head next - camping in one spot, as beautiful as the paradise may seem, has him on edge - as he's been stuck in the garden for far too long. Edwin flips the map right side up, eyes scanning over the bright pastel colors. Part of him wants to be somewhere up high, somewhere where even the best shot arrow couldn't even reach him, where the tendrils of terror from a Gamemaker volcanic explosion would be unable to hold him down, and all he'll have to do is camp out and wait till the rest are dead.

Edwin doesn't even have a weapon, and that is something that is going to have to change, he realizes, before too long.

Folding the map back together, he places it in the adjacent outside pocket of the backpack, hoisting that over his shoulder. He stands up, feet firmly on the ground, testing his shoes against the stone path. Giving one last look around at the bench, in case there is something he is forgetting, Edwin then takes a step forward, about to make his way out of the botanical garden.

He only gets a few steps when there's the sound of wings flapping, a sudden heaviness to it that he hadn't noticed before, and the butterfly that soothed him to sleep hovers in front of him, seemingly dropping from the sky. Edwin stops in his tracks, making a slight frown. He wants to take the creature with him, this beautiful mutt of the Capitol - there is no way nature has designed something this gorgeous and elegant without hints of DNA alteration somewhere - but it has been specified for this area, he is pretty sure, as the botanical garden is the only place for the butterfly to fit. Anywhere else... it couldn't survive.

"I'd stay," he says, nearly about to stop himself from speaking, as there is no way for the creature to speak back, so he's essentially talking to a specimen that will not speak back, like he isn't crazy, "But I have to keep moving. I'm fighting for my life, you know."

The butterfly seems to understand this, each flap of its crystalline wings throwing more and more amaranthine dots to the ground, a delightful elegance, a beautiful elegance, and Edwin wishes to cherish the sight one last time. The insect tilts its head up, a tiny circular shape at the end of its body, and Edwin gets the sight of its proboscis, a thin and dark tube. It - the butterfly - hovers closer and closer to Edwin, as if to give him a kiss, which he is not entirely against the notion, the proboscis starting to lengthen and straighten out.

Edwin can feel the gust of air by the butterfly's wings, something that shouldn't be possible, but he is experiencing it now, _somehow,_ and he is breathing it all in. He goes to say something else, when the proboscis reaches it's maximum length, not much longer than Edwin's ring finger, extends out and touches the right corner of his neck. Edwin lets out a light little laugh, raising his hands to push the extended feeding tube away, as it tickles.

However, just as he noticed in his dream, the air suddenly drops about ten degrees.

The butterfly's proboscis enters his neck.

Edwin's eyes, and he inhales a sharp breath, the feeding tube now a few inches into his throat. He lifts a hand to grab the tube, at its thickest part, when the butterfly's pretty wings, the dazzling and mesmerizing transparent look, turn black, the core of a black hole, the darkest shade of black, and a sudden pain shoots through Edwin's body. Another breath exits his body, but then the butterfly sharply tugs right, and the tube in his neck goes right as well.

The male from District 5 reaches out to grab the butterfly, and when he does, the butterfly wrenches its own body, while still hovering, to the left, and he feels something tear straight through him, straight through his flesh. Edwin's hands manage to ensnare around the butterfly, but the warmth and comfort that he had felt just only a day ago, the same feeling that pushed him into a deep sleep, does not remain. The insect crumbles like dust in his hands, the wings falling apart and shattering like onyx glass. When the proboscis is released from his neck, Edwin watches as it dissipates into cinders, burning away, the lining alongside the tube razor sharp.

He takes another step forward, trying to contemplate what just happened, when his skin feels strangely warm.

Looking down, the remainder of his neck is a putrid scarlet. Edwin cries out, but his sound bubbles, and instead of that, a cardinal globule escapes his throat instead. He presses a hand to his neck, and when he removes his fingers, their stained crimson as well.

Edwin stumbles, downing himself to one knee, hands seizing his throat. He can't breathe, he is starting to see strange shapes appear in his vision, and he's bleeding out from a torn open neck. He coughs violently, trying to crawl forward towards the fountain, but just like in his nightmare, as he tries to make urges towards moving, it seems as if he is stuck in quicksand, unable to go anywhere, unable to get free.

Black spots begin to fill his line of sight, his head swimming with a strange sense of heaviness, and he is unable to keep his head up.

The boy from District 5 lays his head down on the cobblestone path, his neck profusely pouring blood into the dirt.

He bleeds out from the torn canyon in his neck, slowly rolling over so he's looking up at the clear sky, in this beautiful paradise, this wondrous garden.

Edwin does not want his last real sight to be the sky, a horizon of fear and death. Weakly reaching into his pocket, his fingers encircle around the sapphire, and he tries to tug it free, to bring it to his eyes. Wrenching it out of the mesh of his pants, Edwin holds the sapphire up to the sky, blotting out the sun. Blue... his favorite color... mixed with red, it turns purple.

With one final breath, Edwin turns his head to the center, his arm falling slack to the ground, the sapphire tumbling out of his hand and cracking in multiple places, all to the music of cannon fire.

* * *

 ** _Caiden Grove: District 11 Male P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

It is the jolt of the cannon that finally brings his head up from his work, Caiden's breathing shutting off. The day has been silent ever since he woke up, the precious peace disrupted by one harmonic noise... _death._ It is what a cannon means, one less obstacle for him to have to worry about in killing. The arena has been rather quiet, actually, for him, not running into anyone else after the Bloodbath. A rather silent streak of going from one place to another, examining its contents for a possible hideout spot, and beyond that, camping out and making sure no one slits his throat in his sleep.

He wonders who it is, absentmindedly, just for a moment. Caiden does not dwell on the deaths of others, not really feeling one way or another when he stares at Marina's dead face in the sky, or seeing Marissa and Corvus's now fading names shine in their holographic form. They're gone, he's a step closer to victory, and there just happens to be one less tribute today than yesterday.

Caiden has actually appreciated the less noisier days. District 11, home, is too loud. There is too much happening all at once, a cruel and extensive reach of the Capitol that looms in front of everyone else, watching as Peacekeepers place guns to the back of people's heads, an action where even he has to flinch away from, making sure to hold in his lunch before he expels it all, which has happened before without him wanting it to. Something is different about witnessing the deaths of other District 11 citizens than he feels towards the other tributes. If he is against killing - which he isn't, clearly, as Caiden has made it known - then he could simply hide until the end of the Games, create some sort of trap, and then the rest would happen according to some plan. However, he likes to lessen himself on terms of intelligence when regarding cleverly made schemes or scenarios, and so he'll tamper with the odds elsewhere.

When the votes are all tallied up on the end of the first night, Caiden literally shouts at the holographic screen. How dumb could these outer district tributes be? Valencia led the vote with three tallies against her, and then all of a sudden Victoria spirals to the top with six, and he is smacking his head, shaking it back and forth in dumbfounded disbelief. His vote goes straight to Valencia, as she is by far the largest threat, Milor and Carrion underneath her, as he's seen what they can do. If he wants to go home, he is going to pick the tribute he is most terrified of getting in his way. The Games all do follow a certain pattern, when the alliances all eventually split and go their separate ways, and the same would be for the Careers. Caiden can guarantee that Valencia, since she hasn't been voted out and off, is going to be in that pack of five or six tributes left, scattered to the wind, hoping to hold onto a morsel of survival.

The others? The rest of the Career pack? Any of them could make up that five or six, but Caiden already knows that there is a heightened possibility in sort of armed confrontation that the others minus Valencia could die in an instant. He may not be smart intelligently in designing or manipulating the arena in such a way in which it secures him a technical bloodless victory, but Caiden knows he's definitely more intelligent than the dumbasses who do not realize the opportunity sitting in front of their faces when the time is right. None of them hit on the money, and it makes him shake his head.

At this point, they _deserve_ to be killed.

Caiden is standing underneath an awning of one of the arena's shops - or would it be the theme park's shops? Who owns these buildings, technically? - as this is where he goes to get out of the rain. Still pretty much armed to the teeth, what with a backpack, the sword he stole from Marina, in which he taunts Alexandra, and a knife, Caiden feels rather secure, and if anyone is to come across him, there might be a bit of bloodshed that could occur. He knows he isn't gifted in swordplay or with a weapon as much as the Careers, but he can still do damage with brute force, angled enough to make a difference.

Clenched in his right hand is one of the empty vials, poured into his token, which is still wrapped around his neck. The gold chain glimmers in the sunlight, a few waves passing through the heart shaped chamber resting against his dark skin, and it is warm where it sits, the emerald liquid sloshing around still. Caiden cannot remember which body he had taken the necklace from, as it is the main deciding factor when he meets them, long, curly blonde hair down by their head that frames the chambered heart perfectly, to then have that individual become his next test subject.

All he is waiting for, when the time is right, when he makes it back home to District 11, is find the opportune moment to pour the perfect vial, the perfect poison into some water cooler and eventually kill off every single Peacekeeper, all the while being entirely far away from any accusation. Even if it meant that the president would have to send more and more Peacekeepers to replace those that have died, but Caiden is sure at some point the president will just give up. The only unfortunate aspect that has happened is that he's been reaped for the Games.

No biggie, he can work past that.

Unclasping the back of the necklace, Caiden removes it from around his neck, getting closer to the shelf in front of him. The spot he stops at seems to be a shop of some of kind, with a multitude of different kinds of food displayed on shelves, and all someone has to do is approach the table and take whatever they want off of it. Someone else is bound to come this way, he is certain, the shop stuck between a tower of sorts, this marble obelisk that towers into the sky, and a wooden coaster, a structure that Caiden wants to run under, as it looks like so much fun.

Flipping open the top half of the chamber, he stands over a pyramid of fruit, a mix of apples, oranges, and others like pears and limes, although Caiden is sure a tribute is only going to be taking the former two options compared to the rest. One apple in particular speaks out to him, the way the sunlight glimmers off of the fruit's skin, and all he needs is a few drops of the liquid in the vial to make this apple a real killer. Yes, his plan does involve chance, but this is also why he thinks he isn't some adept strategist.

Caiden tries balancing on the tiny ledge to make sure he is standing primly over the apple, about to tip the chamber good enough in which he's got the correct angle. His foot slips off, he swearing, and then the entire chamber tips upside down, an acidic rainfall downpouring onto not just the apple in question but the entire pyramid of fruit.

 _Oops._

He falls onto his ass, wrenching the necklace with him as he goes back, and Caiden pops up, shaking his head, looking in disbelief at his now empty token. His original design does include something to this sort, pouring poison onto other objects that other tributes are sure to touch, but this is a bit overkill... right?

Caiden bites on the inside of his cheek. That had been all of it, every last drop, and all of it just went into this pyramid of fruit. Someone _better_ take from this fruit pile, or he'll be pissed, wasting all that time in the Capitol not training, but rather making sure to get every last little drop of his potion in pristine condition to do some damage. There is nothing he can do about it now except punish his own thoughts for slipping, but there had to have been a better way to do that.

Clasping the necklace back to its original position, Caiden hefts the backpack over his shoulder, picking up his sword.

It looks like he's done here for the day, time to find somewhere else and move camp.

* * *

 ** _Milor Drusus: District 2 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

He's pretty sure Carrion couldn't have picked a more conspicuous spot to get away for a bit of kissing. Their bodies are flushed, pressed together, a sweaty tangle of limbs and hair and cloth, Milor lifting his head up some and to the side while the male from Four ravishingly presses his lips to the other teen's neck, suckling on one sweet spot above the collarbone. Carrion has his hands deep down beneath Milor's waistband, cupping the flesh there, a strange sensation between the warmth of the Career's hands and the chill of the outside air.

Milor closes his eyes, hands getting entangled in Carrion's own locks, he rutting upwards, legs in tandem, feet wrapping around thighs, both boys pressed parallel up against the side of one of the buildings, not that far from the campsite where the rest of the Careers have been talking. Someone could walk upon them at any moment, perhaps even kill them, as their weapons are discarded to the side, but Milor doesn't care about all that.

Carrion shifts his hand upwards some, and Milor lets out a shaky gasp, behind his closed eyes he sees blue and black and supernova white, letting out a faint cry as Carrion lifts one of his legs to place just underneath his wrist, the extra friction and heat too unbearable for Milor, and he trembles in his boyfriend's grasp. It is as if a chill takes hold of the Career, and there's energy radiating off of his body while he spasms under Carrion's hold. Milor kisses him straight on the mouth, biting the lower lip gently if he be so daring, which causes the other to release himself from the kiss momentarily.

He takes out his hand from Milor's pants, eyes widening, and when Milor retracts, his own teeth are slightly coppery, as he bit that lip somewhat harder than he expects.

"You bit me..." Carrion exhales, his chest rising and falling with great distance.

Milor rides the rest of his orgasm, lines fleeting and flying across his vision, so he lets out a light laugh, unlatching his fingers from Carrion's hair, placing his hands above his head, smiling. "I wanted to be a bit bold."

"A warning would've been nice," the Career smirks, kissing him again.

Despite wanting to do this with him for the rest of his life if that had been somehow possible, Milor places a hand against Carrion's chest, blown away every time by the sturdiness of the muscles he feels, an aspiration he could reach himself one day, but that means escaping the arena without his boyfriend by his side. While that might be too strong of a label, and there's an uncertainty on the future that Milor has to worry about, he chooses to ignore it. There's much more right now, in the present, in the current dwellings of his soul, to focus on.

"Hold on there..." he smiles again. "Give me a minute to catch my breath," Milor is really out of breath. He can train with any expert swordsman for hours and hours no problem, but ten minutes containing an ounce of sexual nature kicks the wind out of his lungs. "Besides, we should be careful. What if anyone sees?"

Carrion goes to give Milor another peck on the forehead, but he stops, eyes narrowing slightly, hands resting at the shoulders. "The entire nation knows about you, Milor. And every camera is probably watching us right now because Panem loves it. So, don't worry, everyone's seeing it."

"Well, what about other tributes?"

"You afraid of anyone else not in the Career pack?"

"Well, no-" Milor says.

"Then don't worry about it," Carrion interrupts. "Besides, none of them are going to betray us now. Valencia is smart, Persephone is damaged, Hero isn't strong enough, Maisey doesn't know how to use weapons, and Marcus is... _Marcus,_ " he presses his forehead up against Milor's. "Stop worrying so much. You're going to give me gray hairs."

When Persephone's name passes over Milor's ears, he frowns. He knows Carrion is trying his best and all to be reassuring that nothing will go wrong, but referring to his district partner as 'damaged' just might be what pushes him over the edge. Milor pushes Carrion slightly back, allowing himself to pull his pants back up, zipping the zipper shut, and going to grab his sword. Carrion watches with a strange curiosity, frowning, at the sudden hostility. "Persephone isn't damaged, Carrion," Milor whispers, putting the sword back in its sheath.

Carrion scratches the back of his neck. "I'm sorry, I misspoke."

"She got locked in some sort of Gamemaker trap, got chased by something, and killed Corvus. If that didn't make her upset, I can't imagine what _would._ "

"I'm sorry," he repeats again.

Milor lowers his head, frowning. "I know. I'm not mad." That very well might be a lie, but he isn't going to let Carrion know that. He shouldn't get upset, he realizes, because if he wants to go home, he'll have to make it back to District 2 over Persephone's dead, cold body as well. Milor shivers at the possibility, and the very thought. As long as he isn't the one to kill her, perhaps things won't be as bad, but he isn't about to bank his luck on that.

Carrion locks hands with him, the two starting to make their walk back to the campsite. The others more than likely are going to wonder where they are, even though both of them promised not to stray far, but Milor knows that promises are only as good as those who intend to keep them. Hand in hand, weapons occupying the other vacant ones, it is a strange sight of the arena's cameras, their hair tumbled messes, bruises and hickeys and other fading marks appearing on their exposed skin.

Despite Carrion not saying anything, Milor can feel the question being asked to the open air regardless. _Are you okay?_ Milor in fact wonders the very same thing, about himself, if he is alright or not. A tribute is dead, due to the fact they tried to kill his district partner, at his own behest, and then he loses the same district partner to a Gamemaker trap, only to find her by herself shaking in the rain, terrified out of her mind, having murdered someone else. What state should his psyche be in? Milor has seen death before, on the screens with District 2 broadcasting each game live, citizens huddled together in their own homes or in the town square all looking up. There's been limbs removed from people's bodies, heads chopped off, livers skewed through by arrows, and throats torn open, but it is much different than seeing it in person.

He's seen the dying at the Cornucopia, at the Bloodbath. The blood that appears from Galiant falling down onto a metal spike that protrudes from his chest nearly makes Milor cause his breakfast to reappear, but it isn't the exact same as stabbing Marissa in the gut and watching her bleed out, while he holds her blood stained hand in his, closing her eyes when she passes, and staying by the body until the hovercraft picks up the tribute's corpse. It is much different having her own blood coat his hands, pale flesh drenched in scarlet, coated a hue of crimson, and now he's unable to wash off the excess; it stays, at the spot where his thumb connects to the rest of the palm, dried speckles that he scrubs at over and over again until his skin is a rubbed and raw bright, hot pink.

"I'm okay, Carrion," Milor says suddenly. "You don't have to ask me."

Carrion blinks, raising an eyebrow. "I wasn't even going to say anything."

"I could feel that you were going to ask me," he looks at his boyfriend. "You furrow your eyebrows together before you're about to ask me a serious question."

The Career from District 4 bites on his lower lip, the two stopping in the middle of their walk. Milor can see the beginning flickers of a fire just around the corner of one of the buildings, they reaching the marble obelisk, base camp. While some would argue that building a fire would be an absolutely dumbass thing to do, with possible other tributes around, it has gotten really cold at night to the point where if one of them, any one of them, weren't careful enough, the others would wake up to find them frozen in rigor mortis on the ground.

"I did have one to ask you," Carrion nods his head, "But it wasn't about Marissa. It was about your father."

Milor's mouth dries instantaneously, he licking his lips, letting go of Carrion's hand. Leave it to his boyfriend to be the one asking all the hard questions, all the questions Milor isn't sure he has the answers for. There'd be no way to brace the disappointment or fear, so he might as well get it all over with. "That's okay, go ahead. Ask me."

"If he was such a shit to you, why didn't you do anything about it?"

While the wording of the question is a bit off, causing Milor to take a minor step back, the intent is there. _Why didn't you kill him?_ Saying his answer aloud, it is the first time Milor brings the idea to his own attention. "I dunno. Clearly I can do something about it..." he looks down at his arms, biceps curled upwards from holding the sword. "I have this thing with respecting elders," he says. "Even though my father was an asshole, abusive and everything, I... I couldn't disrespect him. Or any other type of authority."

"Even though, if you go home, you want to kill him?" Carrion laughs.

Milor grimaces a smile back, not because the idea of him killing his father for being an absolute cunt isn't funny, but at the first half. _If you go home..._ and why is it Carrion who is having to insinuate the ultimatum of getting home? Milor gets covered all of a sudden in a shiver, rubbing his arms. Carrion frowns, noticing his boyfriend's displeasure, stepping up to him, and kissing him.

He drowns into the kiss, warmth and comfort spreading through his body, and for a split second, a brief second Milor forgets that there is an arena around him, with people he needs to kill, and all he can feel is the saltiness on Carrion's lips, the cracked feel from the ocean, the scent of the sea clinging to his skin, the wetness of a rain drop sliding down his face, and Carrion's strong hands rubbing smooth circles into his back.

All of it disrupted by the boom of a cannon.

* * *

 ** _Rochelle Pascal: District 3 Female P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

Though neither one of them say it, Rochelle can sense Colt and Alexandra's disapproving stares that pierce through her skin like a lion or tiger's glare, the animal on all fours, paws dancing outwards menacingly, baring their teeth and hissing. She knows how upset they are, at how their ally is so incompetent that she cannot think for herself, that she cannot think about the future and what it contains, instead mourning Deacon's death and doing nothing to avenge him.

In which she laughs nervously to herself. She going up against a Career? Yeah, right. How'd that work out? She's sure, pretty damn sure, that she'll end up the same way poor dead Deacon did, twitching, twitching, _twitching_ with a broken neck, snapped bones by muscular arms, all because the kid thinks he can go toe-to-toe with a Career over a precious backpack. What was Deacon thinking? Rochelle stops her walking, shaking her head. This is the first time since the Bloodbath, the night sky starting to appear on the end of Day 3, that she's dwelled over the end of her district partner.

He hadn't been a disappointment to her, like she had said, all because she's told by everyone and everything that'd give her a second glance to not get close. To not work with others. To not let them get involved and in her head, to do it alone... and how long she listened to that sage advice. Part of her feels terrible - Rochelle is kidding herself, she's _always_ felt terrible about herself - that she severs ties with Deacon on a possible alliance to only then jump on the Colt female alliance bandwagon, leaving the poor kid in the dust. The look he gives her when they split ways after the hovercraft lands will haunt her for the reminder of her days, how ever long that might be. It is the glare that does it in for her, and she mourns him the entire evening, at the end of the first day, when his face shines in the sky forever and ever.

Rochelle makes sure to not drop anything that she's carrying, currently finding dry leaves and tree branches for the fire for tonight. When the three of them stop to camp last night, unable to find Marissa, the feeling among the alliance is rather downcast, as Alexandra's pep talk ramps the excitement level up a few notches, and Rochelle is expecting the girl to absolutely get it, to get what is coming for her... only to find out she dies somewhere in the arena and none of them know who got the kill. Despite seeing Marissa's face shine for a few moments, Rochelle doesn't feel like any sort of thirst for revenge or vengeance is satisfied, as if there had been any type of feeling like that inside her soul in the first place. It is all on Colt and Alexandra instead.

What the day consisted of earlier had been moving camp after hearing the first cannon's shot that is fired, the unpredictability to make all of them stand on edge. After finding their new location, with what seems to be the dead center of the arena, or at least in Colt's mind, the dead center, is a fountain, quite large, but leaving them open to attacks from any direction. However, this is indeed the spot they stop at, and Rochelle is hard pressed to argue, but doesn't feel like making the boy from Twelve's head tick another second closer to being an exploding time bomb, and keeps her mouth shut. Rather, she watches as Alexandra teaches Colt how to fistfight, something that is almost as amusing as it is odd, as Colt's size and stature makes him seem like he is the perfect candidate at knowing how to scrap.

He doesn't want to hit her, in which Rochelle rightly replies, "And Valencia, Persephone, and Maisey are all just going to not harm you because you won't punch them?" She isn't sure what makes it okay in Colt's mind to kill someone else with a weapon, but actually hitting them with your fists is a no-go. What is surprising to Rochelle is how good of a fighter Alexandra is, she tying her auburn hair into a ponytail, stripping off her tribute uniform and tying it around her waist. After a first round ending in maybe ten seconds, Colt pinned under her by her legs, in which Alexandra barely broke a sweat, he drenched with it, and Rochelle clapping, it turns out that Alexandra having two older brothers makes things easy to pick up via wrestling, and Rochelle fist bumps the girl from District 11 back.

Perhaps she should be the one to lead the trio after all, given her strength.

Rochelle moves on thought wise past earlier, trying to hold onto the objects for a fire. All she needs is one more stick and then she'll be okay. The arena is quiet, and she can hear crickets chirping, mosquitos buzzing, and the street lights pop on, the sidewalk doused in an amber glow. The quietness is eerie to her, although Rochelle knows it is realistic, as there are only fourteen of them - counting the cannon heard earlier, around one, makes it fourteen now - in the arena, the chances of running into someone else are minor in the grand scheme of things.

She finds herself in a heavily wooded part of the theme park, a single path in and out to a larger complex, pine trees above her casting shadows onto the sidewalk, Rochelle making sure not to have wandered too far off away from everyone. If she needs to scream, she'll make sure that her cry is heard everywhere. Part of her feels stupid for not having a weapon, but it dawns on her that none of them have a weapon anymore, not after Marissa took them all and didn't do the courtesy of giving them back before dying. The girl from District 3 is armed with a stick, and she plans on using that stick to the death.

Rounding a corner of a building, seemingly going in a square formation from where Colt and Alexandra are setting up to get ready for the evening, Rochelle freezes, almost tripping over herself.

Lying down, huddled together, just inside the entrance of the building she walked around, are two tributes. They're in sleeping bags, both tributes seemingly dozed off to the world. She is unable to tell if there are anymore tributes surrounding them, as it'd have to be the Careers if there were more of them. Tilting her head to the side, she sees something silver gleam off of falling light due to the street lamps. Two silver gleams.

 _Axes._

All the water in Rochelle's throat dries up. Oh shit. _Oh shit._

Only two different people in the entire arena would use axes, and she is sure none of the Careers when training used that particular weapon. _District 7._ There's no other possibility... and she hasn't seen either Peri or Linden's faces in the sky yet, even with the cannon from earlier. Rochelle has just happened upon their own little hideout, she having to take multiple twists and turns to find this spot... and she's unarmed, and they are, and _oh shit..._

Rochelle slowly turns around, trying to keep her breathing calm and level. It is one of the exercises she practices in the Training Center, to monitor your own breath while hiding. They may be asleep, sure, but one wrong move and that might not be the case.

She steps forward, not paying attention to where she's going, her foot hitting the lip of the sidewalk. Rochelle cries out in surprise, tumbling over. Her heart sinks into her chest as she watches, almost in slow motion, the twigs and leaves and other natural items she picked up fall from her hands, colliding onto the sidewalk. She closes her eyes, inwardly cringing, ignoring the pain of falling over as well, and everything clatters loudly, way too loudly for her liking.

It doesn't need anyone to tell her anything, and instead Rochelle scrambles to her feet, running to the nearest tree, a rather large sized one that'll hide her perfectly. She presses her body tautly against it, holding in her breathing, arms by her side. For a second it sounds like there isn't anything, but then she hears it... the rustling of plastic and leather, the sound of shoes scuffling against concrete.

"Anyone out there?" Rochelle hears a girl's voice yell. Definitely Peri. Definitely the female from District 7.

"Peri, you're just hearing things," comes a male voice. Definitely Linden. "Come back and sleep."

"Nope," Peri says, and Rochelle hears the footsteps get closer, now she's just a few feet behind the tree. "Someone dropped a bunch of twigs and leaves and stuff."

"Okay? And?" Rochelle hears an extra pair of footsteps... and that means Linden is up and at them as well. "It might've fallen out of a tree." There's an edge to the male from Seven's voice, almost as if he does not want to lead himself to believe the conclusion both of them are surely reaching.

"Someone had stuff to build a fire. And they might still be out here."

"Peri, seriously-" Linden's voice is tired, a bit droopy, trying to pull out more of a fight, but it dwindles.

Rochelle squeezes her eyes shut. _Please don't come any further._ One pair seems to recede away, but not disappear, and another gets closer, closer, and closer, to now where she can hear shoes kicking a few branches and twigs out of the way, toeing them around with their foot. It must be Peri, from the breathing, but it has Rochelle furrowing her eyebrows together. She's never heard the girl's voice ever be this strong... doesn't she have some form of cancer?

There's no way she is going to get out of this without attracting their attention, and Rochelle doesn't want anyone dying on behalf of her stupidity and her mistake, since if she runs away and Alexandra and Colt do not get their butts into gear, and District 7 decides to chase them, they all just might end up dying. Rochelle takes a deep breath, closing her eyes again, and then opening them. She can do it, she can do this. Rochelle thinks back to her private training session, the wonderful moment that earns her a pathetic three. She ran through an obstacle course and stopped because there had been no way for her to get past the armed mentor at the end of the passage.

She's fast, and she's going to make a break for it. If Peri gets any closer to her, the chances of survival will have dropped from an low percentage to maybe even clear cut zero.

With one last breath, Rochelle tenses her body, unsticking herself from the back of the tree, racing away from Peri and Linden. A croak of surprise hits her ears as she blurs past, wind whipping in her ear, a sharp whistle accompanying the running, and Rochelle's heart beats in her chest.

However, on the wind, as Rochelle books away from the tree with all of her might, is someone screaming at the top of their lungs. "Peri, don't! No!" It's Linden. Linden screaming.

Rochelle doesn't know what it is that enters her back, squarely between the shoulder blades, and the agonizing pain that follows, but all she knows is that it is sharp. As she falls and hits the ground, in too much agony to even cry out, with the axe blade protruding from her back, Rochelle collapses, her feet flailing out underneath her.

Before her head collides against the pavement, she hears it.

Her cannon fire.

* * *

 **15th: Edwin Bishop, 15, District 5 Male. Killed by an arena mutt. Created by IciclePower33. Edwin, thank you for your brilliance. I like to think there was a vast majority of potential in you, and there was, but there were plans in motion that had you out of them. Not only did I get to show off some fantastic aspect of the arena, I've now shown one of the two mutts in the arena, from Bonnie's information, that we've learned about... and it would be fair and ironic that a district dealing with science has a tribute die due to complications from science. Another tribute lost another leg, I will miss writing your character.**

 **14th: Rochelle Pascal, 15, District 3 Female. Killed by Peri Florence of District 7. Created by LongingForRomeo. I think, Rochelle, that potential fits you as well. I had a lot of places I wanted you to go, but unfortunately one of those roads led to your death. We've learned a lot about other characters through your point of view, through your perspective, and we've even made, like Corvus, character development in which you had to be sacrificed. I will say I definitely grew to like your POV's the more and more I got to writing them. District 3 is now the fourth district to be wiped out completely, following Eight, Nine, Six, and now Three. Colt and Alexandra will keep your name in lights.**

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Marcus Pharadane** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ] / **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Persephone Castor** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by santiago poncini20_ ] / **Maisey Rovneay** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ]

District 5: **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon_ ] / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 10: **Hero Slade** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ] / **Alexandra Quinn** [ _Submitted by SparrowBirdEliza_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #29: For Whom the Bells Toll, the end of Day 3 of this Hunger Games Quarter Quell arena, and we are down to just only thirteen tributes in this here story... are any of them looking like clear cut winners? We sadly say goodbye to Edwin and Rochelle, two tributes a lot of you were starting to grow warmth to, which is appreciatory. Things have gotten a bit tighter... as it looks like Milor and Carrion are slowly dividing themselves, Marcus stole Hero's sponsor gift - which will be used for what, you think? - Edwin got killed by a mutt, and if you all remember, there are only two in the arena, one violent, and one non-violent... which one was this butterfly?**

 **Next chapter, #30: Ghost Towns, is actually going to be 'Night 3', same day, just another follow-up tribute chapter since I felt like there are a few tributes who haven't had POV's in awhile that I know you'd like to read and see from, and we'll return to the Capitol storyline at #31, which is rampantly heating up. The arena so far has been fun to explore alongside you guys, and I cannot wait.**

 **I hope you guys review, as I would really like to see ya'lls thoughts! I love you all so much! Have a great day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	30. Ghost Towns (Night 3)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #30: Ghost Towns. This is going to be another arena chapter - two in a row, say what? - but this time we're dealing with Night 3, and it is time we get some character development cranked out, wouldn't you all agree? Last chapter, #29, had another two tribute deaths, Edwin's and Rochelle's and the band of tributes gets ever so smaller... we're down to thirteen, and I understand we're moving fast, but it all happens for a reason. Enjoy Chapter #30: Ghost Towns.**

* * *

 ** _Carrion Bastion: District 4 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

He has felt her eyes on him, on his back, for the last hour and a half. She hasn't said anything, but there isn't anything that needs to be put out vocally for him to understand. He feels the way her eyes narrow, how she furrows her brow in confusion, raising an eyebrow, sitting back with her arms crossed and watching his every movement like some lynx, a panther waiting to pounce on prey whenever they get the chance, but that causes Carrion to laugh to himself. He isn't a little, terrified doe running away from the mountain lion about to slash its throat, that isn't him at all, and if Maisey Rovneay thinks that in the slightest, he might just have to bash the blunt end of a spear into her nose, and break it for good measure.

Kissing Milor, Carrion goes over to his little spot in the back, underneath the obelisk, listening to the chirping of the crickets, the chittering of the squirrels, and the crunch of gravel underneath his district partner's foot as she makes her way from her own corner to his, and he wants to bet on his right foot she has her arms crossed, some sort of petulant, angry expression on her face, and he's all game for it.

They're doing something rather insane. They're going to light a fire. Carrion understands that the reasoning behind why no one ever lights a fire is smart in any sort of Hunger Games capacity, but he rationalizes to himself that this isn't a random spot of woods constructed by the Gamemakers... it is an old place where the citizens of a world before Panem used to go to, preserved by time, and there are lamps everywhere providing light, so unless someone nearby smells the smoke, which with it only being a campfire would not draw that much attention, no unwarranted presence is going to march on them.

No unwarranted presence would dare attack seven Careers, not with the other six tributes that are not _them_ that are left. The only people Carrion is afraid of are Peri and Linden, with their stunning grins, and ferocious fiery hair and downright powerful swings. He overhears the way Marcus talks about how he's ambushed by one of them, the girl, during the bloodbath before he saves Valencia's life. The sudden surge of strength that nearly has an axe blade carve a canyon in his sternum, and beyond that, but since then none of them have had a run in with either District 7 tribute, and part of Carrion feels like it is what will be standing in the way of one of their victories.

Carrion rights himself, a hand balanced preciously on the blunt end of his spear, holding it close for good measure in case, just in case. After all, it is _her_ that has become the deranged one, it is _her_ that acts like she has the ability to walk without her legs, smiling as if everything is alright... oh but he knows her games, the ones she tries to play. He's heard her mutter in her sleep who she wants to kill first, when everyone else has abandoned their dreams to the world, eyes shut, Carrion lying on his mat, exhausted, Milor's kisses pasted around his neck, and the only voice he hears is hers, whispers of a Career doomed to die someday.

What if this is that day?

He tightens his grip around the spear, standing up straight, but not giving her the satisfaction of turning around. "Maisey," he says. "You have something to say?"

"Actually, yeah, I do," her voice is petulant, tired, and oddly enough, angry. He hasn't seen Maisey exhibit anger, something he honestly didn't know she'd be capable of. It fascinates him, actually, how he and her have formed an odd relationship together, a partnership where the glue does not seem to hold, but besides that, a bond where they must work together, being together from Four and all. Their mentors did not expect any familiarity between the two, since they're strangers to one another, tributes that were not meant to even be in the Games in the first place. Yet here Carrion is, due to his drunk, stupid ass, unable to do anything else but complain and try to get out of the arena alive.

Carrion turns this time, balancing on the spear as if it is a walking stick, placing one fist under his chin. "Well, I'm not going to stop you."

"We're district partners, right?" Maisey asks.

He raises an eyebrow, looking around the arena surroundings for a second. "Last I checked... yeah."

"Then how come you've been ignoring me?"

"Ignoring you? Maisey, last I recalled, we spent the entire day together yesterday and all you did was talk about how happy you were to be here," Carrion snorts. It is true. She goes on and on and on and _on_ about how lucky the arena is to have some girl named Maisey Rovneay in the driver seat, when Carrion can smell it on her, he can smell her fear at the fact that she has physically killed someone, a little thirteen year-old girl by decapitating her, when - he cannot believe he is even thinking of this - most of the deaths in the arena are truthfully not that brutal. Carrion knows he killed Deacon, another thirteen year-old, and he knows that there is a strange surge of power that had flowed through his veins after that, but he made the death merciful, no pain whatsoever, no blood whatsoever. He likes to think he would've spared the boy's life if he hadn't been attacked, if he hadn't been provoked, because at the end of the day, Carrion knew that Deacon Fincher would be incapable of causing any real damage to anyone, let alone escaping the arena.

However, there are cracks beginning to show in Maisey's façade, that her little dream is not turning out the way she wants it to, and the effect is almost glorious to watch. Since being in the Capitol, Carrion knows to bite his tongue on a lot of things, as there a lot of potential sponsors watching everyone's every movement, from what they say, to how they sleep at night, and one screw twisted too tight might screw _him_ over from an exceptional opportunity for success, so he keeps silent behind the barb he'd love to throw at her, to insult her about Gaia's death, but he's moved on past that.

Maisey shakes her head, lifting it some, a bulge forming in her throat, perhaps a swallow she is unable to force down... like the truth. "You know what I mean," and there's a labored pause, a heaviness that settles on her shoulders, and it seems that the anger recedes a bit, a wilting of sorts, like she's the girl dressed beautifully in her halcyon dress on stage during Interview Night, to resemble a daisy, a golden bouquet of flowers, and she's crumbled away from the intensity and heat, skin turning to ash and dust. "Milor," she adds.

Carrion pushes his brow together, and has to hold in a laugh. _Jealousy._ Maisey is jealous that someone else is doting all of their attention onto anyone that isn't her, clearly, absolutely, he figures this without a doubt.

"You're jealous..." he whispers, but there is a jesting tone thrown in there for good measure, and he crosses his arms at this, the ghost of a smile twitching at his lips. He does not care where the spear drops.

His district partner locks her jaw, nearly about to stomp the ground in front of the entire country, and something stills her, but the retort back is venomous, matching the fire in her eyes. "I am _not_ jealous," Carrion would beg to differ, from her actions alone, "Just... confused."

That is what strikes a nerve. Carrion flinches at the next statement, unable how to proceed, because he knows exactly what has Maisey confused. He thinks back to the evening right after the Chariot rides, and he is throwing things around their apartment, ticked off at the world and those who run the Games because District 7 - again, District 7, District 7, District _7, it's always those red-haired brats_ \- steal the spotlight with Linden's terrific show of gentleman qualities and Peri's fragility. The plan the two seemed to surmise from their first impressions of their teammates, and that Carrion called Milor cute, is he is to betray him, kill him eventually, especially if he wants to go home.

But does he want to go home? Truthfully? To what? Partying and drinking? Waking up with a killer headache after having sloppy sexual seconds with someone he doesn't know? Now that Carrion puts a bit of thought into it, a chill runs over him, causing him to shudder, but he tries not to show his displeasure to Maisey, to give her any reason to be suspicious of anything. All he'd need is her hounding on him for any sign of weakness.

"That I'm with him?"

"You don't really care for him, Carrion, do you?"

He doesn't bat an eye. "And what if I do?" Carrion gets right up in her face, not trying to be intimidating, but it is a plus that Maisey flinches, stepping back. He isn't really sure what her intention in this conversation has been, and he's pretty sure there's not going to be a definitive answer that will satisfy him. Carrion honestly just wants to push her aside and kiss Milor again, to run a hand down south and below, but he's pretty sure the cameras don't want to see _another_ round of male sexual intercourse. He no longer wants to feel the Career from District 2 up and down and make him blush just because he thought it'd be good to get under someone's skin, but because he actually _cares_ for him, and Carrion didn't know he had that in him to care.

Not like that, at least.

Maisey's eyes fall downcast to the ground, she shaking her head. "Then you must be truly lost."

"If I am lost," Carrion places a finger under her chin, forcing her to look at him. "Then I am glad I am lost with Milor."

Her eyes sadden, almost imperceptibly, but she even forces a slight smile towards it. "I just hope you don't regret it, Carrion."

She pushes his fingers aside - he not even sure why she let him touch her, Maisey being a champion of her own body and all - but a seed of regret buries itself deep inside him, flowering into a full blown plant with petals and a liquid gold center. She goes over and sits back at her spot, lopping down rather unceremoniously next to Persephone, who jolts in shock, but doesn't say anything, and the female Career looks over at Carrion, pursed lips, but she doesn't say anything.

All Carrion feels, down from his toes all the way up to the back of his skull, is regret.

* * *

 ** _Peri Florence: District 7 Female (16)_**

* * *

"Linden!" she calls, not afraid to shout right now with it being close to midnight and that no one is doing any hunting. "Linden, please, slow down!" Peri knows her district partner can hear her, but she also knows that he knows that she isn't stupid, and it is clear as day, written all over his face, how upset he is and the way he seems to stay ahead of her by a few paces. A few _strong_ paces, somesuch where Peri has to literally leap every once in awhile to catch up to him. "Linden!" Peri shouts again.

He stops, just for a pause, to look back at her, and she's surprised to see that his eyes are red, his cheeks stained with tears, and one manages to slide down his face. Linden shakes his head, turning back around, and continuing to walk. She has no idea where they're headed, and personally she is too afraid to ask that right now, but it doesn't matter. When she removes the axe blade from Rochelle's back, winching at the squelching sound it makes, after the echo of the cannon is long and gone rattling her eardrums, she knows that there isn't any turning back that she can do now; Peri's killed someone, didn't even hesitate, and Linden had tried to have her excise some form of constraint.

"You shouldn't have killed her," her district partner says, but he still doesn't look back at her, continuing to trudge through the arena. They're still stick in the wooded part of the park, where the breeze flows, the leaves fall, and shadows pass through amber lighted windows. "She was innocent."

Peri feels terrible for laughing, but that is exactly what she does, tilting her head to the side. Her light stutter, rather a scoff broken by airy periods of silence, has Linden stop, and face her again, but his jaw is locked, looking out under at her from his brow, and she's never seen him so upset, so... murderous. "Innocent? Linden... we're in the Hunger Games. No one's innocent."

"She was unarmed," Linden argues, marching back up to her, and their height difference is nearly negligible, she at his level, and he at hers. Peri notices that his hand is only loosely griping the hilt of the axe, it rather low and down by his side. "She wasn't going to harm us. Rochelle was unarmed and fleeing and you killed her anyways," he inhales sharply, as if the very next statement is betraying everything he knows, hurt reflected in his usually joyous eyes. "You didn't even hesitate."

Something inside the girl's brain is causing a disconnect, as she fully knows damn well why Linden is upset, and that he's using logic to reinforce his stance, his perspective, yet it irks Peri, she feels an itch under her skin that no matter how many times she scratches it, it is incapable of going away, festering forever like a disease. "She was in an alliance, Linden. Rochelle, Alexandra, and Colt were together. Say she got back to camp and told them where we were? Would you've been ready to fight off intruders then?" Her eyes flash a dangerous hue of emerald, but she is trying to keep her emotions calm and under control.

"Do you have any idea how paranoid you sound?" Linden leers at her, placing one hand on his hip. Peri has no idea where this sudden hostility is coming from. After their panicked run away from the Cornucopia, Peri's heart beating in her chest after nearly killing a Career and presumptuously saving her district partner's life, all she sees is fear behind Linden's eyes.

Even in the instances where she's sure that he's sure there isn't anything being reflected in them, Peri watches how his eyes comb over her, appraising in details that make him suck in his cheeks, and tremble out of cold fright while he is sleeping. How his voice isn't as sturdy or calm when they talk about home and what their lives could entail to winning the Games, a shift that Peri notices, but just like everything in the arena, she is unsure on how to feel about it all. Nothing is making sense, and most of all, she isn't making sense to herself, likewise to how Linden is growing ever distant despite the fact their relationship is growing stronger still... with the number of tributes left dwindling, and dwindling, and dwindling, it almost seems to put the responsibility on her shoulders to protect Linden, while it is clear the unruly fourteen year-old is more than capable of defending himself against an attacker stupid enough to go near them.

"It was necessary."

Peri can still feel the way Calhoun Rodney's hands place themselves on her shoulders as he guides her to this capsule standing in the center of a room that she's never seen before. The walls are chrome, with wires and all sorts of black silicon tubes going into and out of the silver cradle, an incubator of something the president is saying, but she is unable to hear him over the cacophony of noise going on. Apprehension seizes her, Peri's throat closing up and each forced swallow being like that of ingesting liquid fire. His hands push her up towards the object, promising she won't be hurt.

Something sharp sticks her in the back of the neck - a needle, she thinks fleetingly - before Peri meets an ushered wave of darkness, black surrounding her, and beyond that, nothing, nothing at all. When she comes to, which is Calhoun standing with a group of scientists in front of her in the lab, Peri on top of a ledge that surrounds the capsule, she no longer feels that sense of vertigo, of the incapacity to stand up has fleeted her. She lifts an arm up to her face, expecting her skin to be some sort of sickish green, but it is a change that is even better. Normally, as Peri has experienced this for quite some time, her body has remained a pale kind of hue, with bloodless cheeks and ghostly white, transparent arms, a see-through ribcage where she can count each one individually and measure the degree of curvature in her body.

All gone. Instead, Calhoun hands her a ball, something simple, rubber, rather and asks her to chuck it at the wall, any which place she wants. Peri raises an eyebrow, not understanding the question. Why would throwing a ball have to do with anything? She has no idea why she doesn't ask anyone in the room, any of the adults who look rather normal without crazy colored hair or eyes that shine fifteen different colors, what they did to her, but Peri complies and picks up the rubber ball. A long time ago she might've been able to throw one, but with her cancer, at the stage and time she's been in, there'd be no way. Is this some sort of cruel joke?

Peri rolls her eyes, winds up a pitch, and when she vaults forward, jolting her right arm so quickly in the forward direction that she nearly rips her arm out of its socket, the ball flies from her hand, embedding into the wall, creating some sort of crater where it lands. There's tones of hushed surprise tossed around, but in the center, Calhoun is grinning, grinning like a maniac.

She's been injected with some sort of strength serum, as the easiest descriptor she can think of, where she is unable to feel the effects of her leukemia. While it has not stopped the cancerous growth, which means that Peri has to live on her toes, dancing on the edge with the devil doing a flamenco, hands wrapped around her throat whether they be her own or the devil's... it is giving her a fighting chance. The strength is an added side effect, nothing ridiculous beyond throwing a rubber ball into a wall, but it is no longer going to make her a write away death, and her odds have risen dramatically.

Calhoun's hands are warm on her shoulders. " _I can't cure you, as that would be beyond cheating, but I just wanted to give you a chance. Everyone in the Games deserves that,"_ he says, eyes forgiving, and Peri realizes that this president is not some sort of ridiculous monster, not some terrible despot who rules with an iron fist; he's just one with a heart that knows how to extend compassion, put in a precarious position, a beyond deadly place with nothing else for him to but stand on the sidelines and watch it all happen. " _Should you win, you'd be rich enough to get treatment. To cure yourself..."_ and the president hugs the girl from Seven then and there, and she's unsure or not if he is sniffling when they hug. " _One day no one will have to experience this. Any of it. I promise..._ "

Peri will never forget Linden's expression when she comes out of the terminal. Had it been elation? Wonder? Joy at her having a fighting chance? She cannot quite tell. Whatever expressions he has had have soured since then, though, she can tell.

She has no idea what he's referring to, the experience, whether it be her cancer or the Hunger Games, or perhaps all of it, but there isn't any time for her to dwell on it.

And that is the last she hears from the president before the next day, before the arena, and now she has Linden standing in front of her, pointing a finger angrily in her face. "Ever since you got that serum you haven't been the same! Paranoid, reckless, and _stupid..._ " he spits out the last word.

Peri laughs again, having the audacity to throw a hand to herself. "Stupid? _Stupid?_ "

"You attacked a Career, Peri!"

"To save your life!" she shouts. "I saved your life and you're telling me that I'm _stupid_?" Peri wants to slap him, almost going to, but that'd be a whole new can of worms she is unable to deal with. She still doesn't know if she could do it or not... to end Linden if they got down to the final two. If she wants to be cured, she needs to, but something still holds her back. "Would you rather I have let Marcus kill you?"

"No," he protests.

"Then what are you bitching to me about it, for?" Peri yells back at him.

"You turned every Career against us," Linden snaps, and she knows that he's right. She showed her hand to early, proved to everyone, even if Marcus is the weakest Career out of the seven still alive, that she's strong, and that there isn't an ailment holding her back; seven people in the arena that could be a bigger match than she is unable to face all at one time. "And do you honestly think you and I can hold off seven Careers all hellbent on killing us?"

Peri shakes her head. "What do you want me to say Linden?" She is sure there is absolutely nothing she could say to even make him quell the fire inside his soul, Linden perhaps that too far gone with his opinion of her. "I feel like I can't do anything to change your mind."

Her district partner leans back some, probably to give another sharp retort, but all there seems to be is a light sigh that escapes his lips, Linden biting on the inside of his cheek, and nodding his head. "You're right. I don't want an apology as you didn't offend me... you just-" he shakes his head. "I don't know Peri. All I know is, whatever person you're becoming and starting to change into, I don't like it."

"Would you rather I turned back into the tribute who couldn't even stand up without falling over?" she retorts, her words a bitter an acidic spat.

"Of course not."

"Then I can't help you."

Linden looks down at the ground. He opens his mouth, to say what Peri has no idea, but he closes it again, shaking his head. It doesn't even matter anymore, does it? "Whatever, Peri. Let's just... let's keep moving. I don't want the Careers to all of a sudden change their hunting schedule and we get caught up by them. They won't spare us either, just like how you didn't spare Rochelle."

With that, her district partner turns around, totally ignoring the glare she gives him, trudging on through the arena under the cover of darkness. The rains will weep, should there be another storm again, but it will pale in comparison to the storm that rages in Peri's heart, as she stalks after him.

A divide begins between the kissed-by-fire siblings.

* * *

 ** _Alexandra Quinn: District 11 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

After an hour of Rochelle wandering off to go retrieve items for their fire, and still not having returned, Alexandra grows worried. Well, she needs to correct herself mentally; her worry is a lot more different compared to those who'd actually _care_ about the girl from Three's life... and the girl from Eleven can confidently say that Rochelle's life is not what concerns her, it is not what has her worried. It is what the alliance member's death might mean in the grand scheme, the larger picture, with numerical context.

The number of tributes not in the Careers wear thin, while their numbers remain strong... and when the cannon fires, jolting Colt out of his sleep, Alexandra knows. Rochelle died out there in the arena, and most certainly by someone else; it is readable on the girl's face that she isn't strong enough mentally to have the courage to take her own life.

Colt wraps up his sleeping bag, stretching, but the look of worry on his face is palpable. Rochelle still hasn't come back, and Alexandra believes that perhaps she is _never_ coming back, no way to recover from a death, and until they see her face shine in the sky will her suspicions be proven correct or not. They never seem to be able to stay in one place after listening to a cannon be fired; the one earlier in the day doesn't do much but freak them out, but this one, with it being so late in the day, and sounding so close... Alexandra doesn't argue when Colt believes they should find a building to sleep in for the night.

She has her hair tied back into a ponytail still from their little scrap, her elbows hurting from having them pressed down against the hard cement. Colt holds a sharpened stick as a weapon, unless they never are able to come across a weapon, and Alexandra feels a bit more exposed than normal, as she is sure there is no way she'll be able to beat a Career into submission with her fists. Her brothers never taught her how to snap necks, unfortunately, and with that additional thought she shudders. Could she do it? Could she kill?

Alexandra shakes her head, trying to get the thought away from her consciousness. All she has to worry about now is finding a new place to sleep tonight and if Rochelle will find them again.

"What if the cannon isn't Rochelle?" Colt asks a bit into their walk. They'd stay, they really would, Alexandra likes to think that of herself, but they cannot hold that chance. It has always been a nagging thought in her mind that the alliance would only really work between her and Colt, as they are the ones who've taken the arena most seriously, have the right attitude, and could actually fight. Part of her feels terrible for admitting that, for having always had the thought in the back of her head, like the buzzing of a gnat someone tries to ignore.

"And if it is? Chances are that a Career caused that cannon, and I don't want us to take the chance of it being them hunting and they come across us."

"Moot point," he nods, holding the stick out so he can use it to walk. Alexandra thinks it looks rather foolish, actually, but it is almost humorous still, that he lost his weapon, a dangerous weapon, and then the only thing he has to protect he and her with is a sharp piece of wood, which any of the steel blades in the arena could cut in half in seconds.

They continue to walk in silence, Alexandra noting on the horizon, starting to break through the trees, is this monstrous tower, an obelisk structure made of marble that shines in the moonlight. It is rather pretty, she smiling at the fact that there's nothing that pretty in District 11. It's just rows and rows of trees - rather orange groves, lines of apple orchards, bananas, strawberry fields, greenery everywhere in one direction - for the harvest, and on the opposite side, stone walled buildings, buildings that all resemble prisons for homes, and how even Victors Village is rather depressing with monochrome brick colors and cracks that split the foundations, moss growing on the sides, stenches of ivy and rust that waft into the air.

Alexandra notices that with none of the rides running, thirteen people maximum stuck in the arena, and it being night time, how quiet the arena is. When they were stuck in the Capitol before the Games, there isn't a single moment of solidarity piece, there's a sound bouncing off of some wall somewhere, and it is delightful, yet almost creepy, to finally be able to hear her own thoughts after so long of not having that luxury... the little things she takes for granted.

"Do you hear it?" she says, looking over at Colt, they walking equal with one another.

"Hear what?" he frowns. "I don't hear anything." His tone is a bit on edge, as if there is a noise that is so sudden and disrupting that it is alarming, which is probably not the best thought to hear right about now.

She grins widely. "Exactly, nothing. Silence..." her voice vibrates with it, relishing in the opportunity to take notice of what is in front of her. "When's the last time you've ever heard silence?"

"Last night..." Colt replies point blank, blinking. _Oh, well._ Alexandra shrugs; she's never taken her ally to be some sort of conversation master, rather just butting in when it's needed, and perhaps, in his life, it's _never_ needed. "Can I ask you something?" he prompts, a few moments later, they still walking.

"Sure. I'm an open book." She is not an open book. She's never been an open book, and where that idea came from, she has no idea. Alexandra rambles when she's afraid, or nervous, which luckily for her, isn't something she experiences a lot. Being nervous to her is a waste of an emotion, and while everyone expresses it at some point for whichever reasons - no one is immune or excluded from common human nature - Alexandra places it alongside envy and jealousy as a stupid feeling to waste her time in going under, since it does nothing to change her. It is her picking an apple for it fall out of her hands and fall into the manure pile... a period of time that has all been for naught.

Colt scratches the back of his neck, the duo reaching a spot in the arena when they're aligned just down the middle of the obelisk, where Alexandra can barely see it peeking over the top of the trees, its top a pillar of translucent sapphire. "Why does Caiden hate you so much?" Not the question she is expecting, and the blanching of her face - not an expression of nervousness, however - makes Colt lift his hands up in defenselessness. "You told me that he poisoned you and played mind games with you at the Cornucopia. Sounds like you and him have a history that goes beyond just disliking one another, like Rochelle and Deacon..." It is as if saying the names of both tributes from District 3 that they're having life breathed back into them.

Alexandra squeezes her eyes shut, trying to forget the memory, but it's impossible to do so. She can recall it like it had been yesterday, and truth be told, it's been several years now, back when she's twelve, a bit shorter, hair not as red, and attitude not as fierce. It is a scorching hot August day, the day after the reaping, her _first_ reaping, standing in those stupid stock pens like cattle about to be killed, and she's survived. Caiden is twelve as well, starting to hit his growth spurt, the sun shining a chocolate luster on his skin, and Alexandra has always admired him from afar, knowing his family is in the business aspect of the district, and well respected. Her brothers, both twins, made it past their last reaping, safe from the claws of the Capitol forever, and take note in their sister's sudden interest in Caiden. Alexandra knows that it had never been any sort of romantic take; she simply respects the guy and his family, and they begin to get close, friends if you will.

It has always been a problem of hers, Alexandra knows, of wanting things she doesn't have. She's never been jealous, and it isn't jealousy... but rather the desire to acquiesce an item or property she didn't claim before. One day while inside Caiden's house, her eyes land on it... a jar filled to the brim with money from buying customers, and what a gorgeous little bag of gold she's found at the end of the rainbow. It took a bit of time, but one day, when he isn't looking, she takes the jar and makes for the hills. Her family could use the money way more than Caiden's needed it. Besides, as businessmen, couldn't they just make the money and more back in the next cycle? That is until a few days later, a Peacekeeper comes a knocking on their doorstep, dressed in their snowstorm white uniforms, a hand rested firmly on the butt of a freshly painted pistol. Alexandra can picture clear as day the charcoal colored paint rubbing off into the rubber of the gloves that the Head Peacekeeper is wearing. The Grove family believes they've been robbed and Caiden suspects the Quinn family; stealing is one of the worst laws to break in Eleven, but her eyes are bigger than her stomach, and her heart beats with excitement as her hands wrap around the base of the jar... a good four or five hundred dollars at least.

In a panic, her brothers take all the money and bury it out in their backyard, planting some sapling to hide the evidence, and they break the jar, throwing the shards into a fire. From what the Head Peacekeeper believes is that there isn't any money stolen, the Grove family is short five hundred dollars, and Alexandra's committed a crime.

"I stole from his family when I was twelve," she says.

Colt's eyes bug out of his head, wide eyed where she can see the circle of anemic white. "Stole? Like... money?"

"Five hundred dollars. His family sold produce."

"Holy shit, Alexandra..." Colt sucks in a breath, sharp and hot, where she can feel the temperature change on her arm. "I never would've taken you to be a thief..."

Alexandra rubs her arms innocuously. Even talking about the memory freaks her out, as if Caiden is going to come pop out of the ground with a knife and stab her, dragging her under the dirt. "I foolishly thought since they had a business that they could just make all the money back..." she swallows, her mouth going dry. "It turned out that their family couldn't afford enough food for the next year, and Caiden signed up for tesserae. He was reaped," Another sharp in take on Colt's side. "We had a volunteer for the boys, some eighteen year old who I think thought could win. That guy died at the bloodbath."

"And Caiden got reaped again..." Colt saying that out loud feels like a sledgehammer hitting Alexandra in the liver, pain shooting through her abdomen. "God, I actually feel kind of terrible."

She presses her hands into her eyes, a warm and serene sunburst glow absorbing into her skin. "When we were fifteen, I admitted to him what I did," she swallows again. "I will never get the look in his eyes out of my head, after I told him." A stare filled to the brim with hurt, shock, a pain that is unable to replicated even if it were a thousand suns spitting fire onto her skin. "My brothers went to go and dig up the money, since we left it there, but we were hit with a lot of storms that summer and our backyard got flooded. The plant was uprooted and the money was washed away forever..." she shakes her head. "Five hundred dollars gone like that," Alexandra snaps her fingers.

"You're lucky he didn't report you to the Peacekeepers."

"I suppose," Alexandra shrugs, and then smiles grimly, as if there is a blade clenched between her teeth. "Well, I'd say that getting reaped into the Hunger Games is as big of a punishment as any, right?"

"And after that?" Colt crosses his arms.

"Caiden told me later that he forgave me. That he wanted to be on a clean slate," Alexandra scoffs. "I believed him like an idiot. Clearly he didn't forget, and clearly it isn't water on the bridge if he is so hellbent on trying to kill me..."

"But obviously that's not going to happen, right?"

"I'm not letting him take my life just because I nearly took his," Alexandra knows that there is no way what she said is going to be able to be twisted in some positive way, that what she's uttered is downright terrible, but she's right, if anyone feels hard pressed to argue. Five years ago she made a terrible mistake, he nearly died, but didn't, and now she's going to lay down on the train tracks to have the bullet train come and run her over? Alexandra is unable to stand there and purposefully watch the firing squad load their rifles to shoot her dead.

Even as she says it, feeling the acid burn the back of her throat, and hell beneath her extend its reach just a bit for the lack of humanity that she puts forward, Alexandra sets her shoulders back.

No showing any signs of weaknesses to the audience, to Panem.

She has a Hunger Games to win.

* * *

 ** _Annabellina Circuit: District 5 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

Darkness takes her. They feel like tendrils clawing at her from beneath the surface, black and scaly, fingers transforming into talons that slice and scar and reap. Her head swims with a murkiness, a cloudiness that acts like a haze she is unable to see through, arms flailing out in the dark with an inebriated sense of terror rising in her throat. When she calls out through the bleakness, nothing comes out, syllables rut in her throat and generate heat, but it is as if she is floating in the onyx emptiness of space, all the stars gone dim, no light shining from their hydrogen core any longer, and the expanse of chill covers her once more.

Behind shut eyes, eyes that seem to be unwilling to open, a conscious soul incapable of awaking - that or they choose to stay shut forever - there is the face of a boy, a boy she thinks she recognizes, but she's unsure whether or not the image she sees is truly there in the first place or another figment of her imagination elsewhere in this kaleidoscope land of terror. Brown hair combed to the sides, a gentle smile, a happiness behind his diamond eyes, and then a torn open throat with fresh blood dripping from the jagged seam, but if he notices the life leaking out of him, there is no sign to give this away. She wants to speak, she wants to say something, but again, it is as if the girl is trying to vocalize through a brick wall, where sounds waves do not travel through opaque surfaces, likewise to light being unable to transparently beam into and out the other side.

The boy takes a step towards her, she trying to scream, as his smile is twisting into a snarl, a sneer, a howling face where imaginary lines begin to dig themselves into his cheek, dragging outwards and slicing his face open, he hissing her name over and over again like some serpentine call. She kicks with all of her might, her foot colliding with his face, and one side shatters like glass, shards of flesh and crystalline shards floating into free space. The girl screams, backing up again, and the boy's terrified yelp of pain echoes around the chamber, echoing in her ear drum, a call of agony that'll go on forever and ever and ever and ever and ever until she'll hold her hair in her hands, tearing follicles out with the might of a titan, bashing in her brains on the side of the wall just to get the demons to stop.

Annabellina Circuit, who is trapped, just not in a pitch black room, jolts awake in a cold sweat.

The distorted image of Edwin, her district partner, fades, of the boy she tried to kill, of the boy she nearly killed and who is supposed to be her side throughout the ordeal. Whenever she closes her eyes, whenever she tries to dream away the real life terrors, the ones in her imagination only get worse and worse as the days go by, and Annabellina can feel the upsetedness sink from her shoulders down into the soles of her feet. If it has only been the third day in the arena, and she's experiencing some traumatic form of a zombie Edwin try and kill her... what could await for her on the ninth or tenth day? Say she escapes the arena? What then?

" _Why are we questioning our escape?_ " Abe growls. " _You know I'm getting us out of here by fighting._ "

She's too exhausted to even argue with herself, as absolutely downright silly as it sounds. Annabellina awakes out of terror from what she's dreamt, but also due to something else. A high pitched wailing - not necessarily a wail, but it isn't a delightful sound either - echoes through her vicinity of the arena, a constant and persistent ringing, like a homing beacon, and it is a nagging outside interference inside her own head that causes her to open her eyes, eyelids that feel like cinder blocks on top of them whenever she blinks.

In the two days since the Bloodbath, Annabellina spends her time either picking up the knife and fighting with some column that Abe believes to be a tribute by the way she's beat it up so much that she's been bending the surface. Every time she goes to sleep and wakes up, the Gamemakers mend the side of the building, only for her - or for Abe - to go wreck house against it. Late last night, after the moon has risen high in the sky beyond the point where she should be asleep, Annabellina picks up her knife and sets out a bit into the arena, coming up to a wooden sign to the east of her current position. Beyond that, she is unable to take a single step past the wooden sign, her arm passing through some gelatinous material that sends her into a frenzy, the girl from District 5 slicing it up with her knife that only seems to make the gelatinous feeling stronger and thicker around her bicep.

Whenever Abe is not in control, she tries to go back to the barrier, or that is at least what Annabellina assumes it to be, that she's found one of the ends of the arena and the Gamemakers, like with the column, are messing with her since she just might be the most captivating thing these Capitol people even have.

Annabellina rubs at her eyes, getting out from under her cover, a shop awning as she's been sleeping on a bench for the last two days, her back killing her, but she does not want to sleep on the solid concrete for whatever sort of disgusting bacteria she could bathe in. There is hardly any light in her section of the arena, no amber lamp posts to shine her way through the steel and wooden maze, but personally, she doesn't care; Abe could kill someone in the pitch black due to their breathing, he's made it very well known.

The only indicator, besides the constant beeping, that there is even an object out in the gloom is this syncopated light that blinks every time Annabellina blinks - she thinks its doing that, but she might just be going a step beyond crazy - and stays shown for no more than three seconds. It is a crimson dot in the black that appears, a color far too similar to blood that it sends shivers up and down Annabellina's arms.

" _It's a weapon. I can already taste the blood it will spill in my mouth,_ " Abe rubs his hands together greedily, smiling evilly.

When she reaches it, the beeping is one of the loudest noises she's ever heard, maybe second to only the hot wire she touches that births her mind children, the last living child being the one who holds the reins tethered to her soul. Annabellina steps back in surprise, placing a hand to her mouth. It... it's _beautiful,_ and this thought has no bearing from Abe whatsoever, it is a conclusion she reaches herself, purely herself.

On the ground is a silver capsule, a sponsor gift Annabellina is certain of, the white attached note hanging off the edge of the rim by a thread. She picks it up, eyes scanning the text.

 _This sponsor gift is actually a day and a half late... sorry Belle. An anonymous donor wanted to give this to you, and it has never been something sent to any tribute before, so Lewlyn had to check it over and over again with the president and the president's wife to make sure of its legitimacy and that it can be used. You're in luck; it can! Just... try to make sure you don't destroy anything or yourself with it, this weapon is beyond dangerous. The anonymous donor told me in a message that you 'messed shit up' with their gift, so I suppose you don't want to let them down._

 _Enjoy it, and may the odds be ever in your favor,_

 _~ Sincerely, K_

Annabellina lets the note fall to the ground, Abe squashing it with his foot and crunching it under the sole of their boot like one crushes a roach or a pest. Abe nearly faints over when looking at the sponsor gift, and their mentor is not wrong, at how dangerous their newly acquired item is. Annabellina tries picking it up from the bottom, nearly tipping it over, swearing profusely as she nearly ignites a nearby patch of grass.

It is a can about the width of her torso, half as tall as her, spray painted a gorgeous and glimmering cardinal. Attached at the top is a nozzle, underneath it a pressure spot, like a button, or what she's seen people use to eject oil from a hose, it extending from the can. Two black straps stick out on the other side for her to wear on her back, and on the center of the can, underneath the Panem logo, surrounded by a ring of gold letters, is a flame icon, with the pallid inside, and her blood turns to ice.

Annabellina's sponsor gift is a flamethrower.

* * *

 ** _Hero Slade: District 10 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

For what must be the first time since being reaped, Hero can feel his face tugging at forming a smile, and eventually, he breaks free from his constraints, howling with laughter, doubling over with glee as he watches Carrion tilt back a bottle of vodka, chugging, chugging, _chugging_ until half of the bottle is gone, and the Career bowls over himself, sputtering liquid onto the concrete, Milor pounding his boyfriend's back to get any excess out of his system. He might be pounding for quite some time, as Carrion is almost half a bottle in by this point, and its only been a half hour.

The sponsors in the Capitol must be damn insane, because sure as shit, in the middle of the gathered group of Careers, all seven of them sitting around a campfire, their weapons placed perfectly in reach, is a cooler. It unceremoniously seems to fall straight out of the sky like a meteor, colliding with the ground and scaring them all half to death, Valencia turning around with her sword and unleashing a battle cry to only then rush at a gigantic piece of plastic. Inside it is bottle after bottle of liquor, and attached to it is a note from Lance Viel, Marcus's mentor, but the note itself is rather directed to Carrion who has made his drinking habits known.

"What is it?" Persephone asks reproachfully, peering over Marcus's shoulder, as Carrion pokes it with his booted foot.

When the male from District 4 looks back at the rest of them, face wide in a grin, he bursts out laughing. "Alcohol! A case full of alcohol!"

That is how, just a little under an hour later, with the moon high in the sky, under an orchestra of the chirping of crickets, the Careers find themselves all sitting around a campfire, passing around bottles and taking swigs of drinks. The only person not truly drinking is Valencia, the head honcho sitting with a glass of wine and occasionally taking small sips. Maisey and Carrion are in competition to see who can take the most shots without needing to throw up, but Milor makes them both stop two shots of vodka tonic in to make sure the entire arena does not awake to the sounds of their retching. Persephone refuses alcohol rather blatantly, sitting rather close to the fire, knees hugged to her chest as if she is freezing cold, which is odd since it is actually the opposite, especially being as close to the embers as she is.

Hero has a hand circled around the base of a beer bottle, never having tried the drink before, but after he takes a sip, initially getting over the bizarre taste, liking it for the strangeness that follows when it hits the back of his throat. He only wants to have one though, as there isn't a whole lot to go around and he knows that it wouldn't be smart for any of them to be full on drunk come morrow, and they all end up dying or something.

Carrion's face is flushed a bright pink, beads of sweat pouring down his forehead while he grins crazily, holding a beer bottle in his hands. He tilts the beer back to take a sip, the amber liquid disappearing behind pale lips, lips that Hero notices, nearly getting lost in them, sputtering to himself after a moment of being transfixed. "So, princess," he says, nodding at Valencia, "Why aren't you drinking? There's plenty of it. It must've cost our donor a ridiculous amount of money!"

She shakes her head, waves of lemonade hair dancing alongside her back. "Nope. I'm not getting trashed at a time like this. It's too dangerous," and then with a softer approach. "It's okay that ya'll do, though," and Hero shifts somewhat. Her tone is sad, almost melancholic.

"It was meant as a gift for all of us," he pushes a bit harder.

"Then that means more for you," Valencia smiles grimly.

"Spoil sport..." Carrion mutters, saying it towards the rim of the bottle, his voice vibrating with timbre in the glass container. Another sip, and another second that Hero takes a fleeting glance at the boy from Four's lips... no wonder Milor is transfixed on them. They're quite sultry. Victoria had nice lips.

Maisey, who has been trying to get Persephone to join them the rest of the night, with one arm wrapped around the other girl's body, removes her hand, blonde hair illuminated by the red glow of the blaze in front of them. She scoots forward a bit more, legs crossed in front of her, another bottle resting down in front of her. "Are you afraid that if we get drunk, Valencia, that we'll all be killed by something in the morning? Is that your biggest fear?"

Valencia looks at her, eyes narrowing, and Hero can feel a chill run over the back of his legs, the contempt in Maisey's voice quite palpable. He sees it written all over the blonde's face, how her eyebrows come together in a slight expression of disappointment, the twitching of her lips into a frown of contempt noticeable at times where Maisey believes no one can see her, but Hero stays quiet. It still does not feel like the right time to say anything and disrupt what is going on... an olive branch still exists - fragile, yes, but it exists all the same - and he is not willing to take the blame at being the one who burns it down.

"Afraid? I didn't say anything about that," the girl from District 1 responds, a levelheaded answer, where her face does not betray any semblance of irritation or otherwise a negative reaction. "I just think it is foolish." Marcus nods along with his district partner. "I should be allowed to worry about your safety." Hero would never have imagined their pack leader to be some revolutionist calling for humanitarian change. "That doesn't make me a bad person, Maisey."

"Well, what is your biggest fear, then?" Maisey raises an eyebrow, taking a sip. "That we're on the subject..."

Valencia frowns, not quite understanding the train of thought that has led the conversation to this rather distorted point. Hero's head is swimming, but that might be due to the alcohol. Suddenly, looking at the beer bottle, it no longer tickles some strange fascination in him, rather it gives off a malevolent vibe, like there's a foul voice carried on the air that is trapped inside his own glass. Hero pushes it aside.

"I suppose I'm afraid of being in a situation that I can't endure," she looks away from the Career who asked the question, her gaze passing over the column of smoke rising into the air, a breath from the body of a translucent phantom. "Like... a torture."

Marcus sits up, his demeanor, which had been rather relaxed for the extension of the evening, turning into a more concerned bundle of flesh and bone. He reaches out to give Valencia a hand, which she takes, holding onto it and squeezing for comfort.

"Well, I guess we're gonna share our dark secrets, aren't we?" Carrion slurs his words, sitting up quickly like Marcus, fast enough that beer sloshes out of his bottle, splattering onto the concrete with a rather sickening noise to hear at night, a squelching sounding like mud beneath boots, or the sizzle of blood onto a hot knife. Hero shudders at the thought. Carrion's tone is jovial, but there's a darkness hidden in the syllables somewhere, a reverberation akin to that of an ominous thunder cloud. "I'm self-destructive," he admits. Milor leans in a bit, curling by the fire into the other Career, a dark sadness reflective in the boy's stare. "I'm afraid of getting so drunk one day that I don't wake up, forever stuck in some pit. A coma."

"And yet you're drinking now?" Valencia frowns.

"And yet I am drinking now," Carrion lifts the bottle up, smirking, bringing it to his lips. There's a pause, the gang holding onto it with bated breaths. "And so I drink," he whispers, barely audible over the cracking of the fire. He tilts the bottle back, swallowing the last drop of the golden amber liquid, Hero watching his throat bob with the movement, and then Carrion chucks the bottle over the campfire and into the cooler. "To death and decay..." Carrion nuzzles his chin on top of Milor's head.

Hero didn't expect the night to become this rather deep, dark thing. A moment where they're all on one playing field and no one is being judged, no one is having dirt thrown in their face and being called a coward; they're all together in this revealing of how they all have some chamber they never unlock deep inside their heart that contains the blackest element of their souls.

Marcus sighs, running a hand atop his head really quickly. "I am terrified of being a disappointment."

"What do you mean?" Milor asks gently, lifting his head from Carrion's chest, the position seeming rather comfortable.

Hero's body aches for Victoria; she may have rejected him in the end, and he may have celebrated her death at a time when it had not been inappropriate, sneering and gleefully watching as her neck is broken, but they were there for one another, to clench hands in the ever approaching darkness, to share body heat in the coldest snap of winter, and now she's gone, gone too early in this hellish arena, and he's having to face the terrors alone.

There seem to be tears in the male from One's eyes, but Hero isn't sure whether or not they are real or just for sympathy. "A lot of family history and unexpected pressures. They... they want me to win the Games," Marcus squeezes his eyes shut. "I just don't know if I have it in me..."

 _I hope you don't,_ Hero tells himself. Marcus having it in him to become a victor means the death of everyone sitting in the circle, and there are people Hero would love to see become a victor over Marcus Pharadane, as much as that might hurt to admit, but it doesn't matter. Hero has to have everyone sitting here die in order for him to make it back to a District that is going to hate him, a district that will want to string him up by his feet and stab nails into his hands for how he treated Victoria.

Maisey laughs a little, whether it be from the alcohol or something else. "Believe it or not, I'm scared too..." she admits, scratching the back of her neck. "I know that I walk around so confident, but it's all a ruse and-" Carrion snorts at that comment, as if he would've never guessed, but it is shut down rather quickly by her glare. "I'm scared of reality."

"Reality?" Hero echoes, frowning. What on Earth does that mean?

"Reality," the Career repeats, and the fire crackles alive once more, sparks and embers tumbling into the sky. "I sit here and think I can win the Hunger Games, and maybe I can, but I know I'm just not as well prepared as the rest of you," Maisey smiles to herself, eyes flitting down to look at the ground. "That I have a skill set that doesn't produce a victor and... that it's rather hopeless. I'm scared of the reality that I could very well and easily die in the arena like any of you. That I'm... that I'm not-" she swallows heavily, holding her arms tight, and the drop of happiness in her seems to be sucked dry like the sapping of bone marrow with a hypodermic needle. "The reality that I am not invincible..."

Hero used to think, right before the end of the Bloodbath, that Valencia is invincible. All he sees the girl do is exert masterful boughs of strength, achieve to earn the highest training score out of the entire bunch, sway the Capitol and perhaps the country in a masterfully done interview, and then have the confidence to know her boundaries, her strengths, her weaknesses. That is until he sees her nearly die twice at the Bloodbath, once when Galiant's slimy hands grip around her ankle, dragging down, down, _down,_ and when Blake tosses her weapon to the dirt as if it hadn't even been there in the first place. If Valencia Shale isn't invincible, Maisey Rovneay isn't either.

"Mine's rather unconventional," Milor pipes up, gripping Carrion's left hand like a lifeline. "I uh, I admitted to Carrion that I have a really bad problem with authority, like disrespecting them. It was why I let my father abuse me for so long..." the Career who normally goes around with his shoulders set back, head held high, a smile on his face looks like a frightened eighteen year-old sitting thousands of miles away from home. "If I were to win," Hero notices the fact that Milor's humble, that his ' _were_ ' does not go unnoticed, "I'm just scared that the Capitol might make me do something that just goes against who I am. And, because I can't disrespect authority, I'm gonna do it and it absolutely terrifies me."

"Like what?" Maisey prompts kindly, gently.

"I dunno. Like- like killing a child, maybe. Like, a six or seven year-old..." Milor's face darkens perceptibly with each word, physically shutting himself up as he speaks, swallowing heavily. Carrion rubs his boyfriend's back, soothing shapes into his shoulder blades, and the look of pure bliss reflected on the male from Two's face is a heavenly sight to watch.

Marcus juts his head in Hero's direction. "How about you?"

Hero glares at the Career from District 1. He isn't going to say anything. While it might be unfair because everyone else has said something, they're still voluntarily giving away that information, not holding back, even though the entire country is paying attention to every word they're saying. He can picture it now, the administrative staff hearing Milor's fear, whisking themselves away to devise a scenario that'll make the very same thing he's afraid of happen, all because they got too personal for one another. He isn't making that mistake again.

Besides, he's already admitted it, to the very same guy asking him the damn question. Hero doesn't mean to really reveal all that much to Marcus, but he does as it is late and he's bored, and he's already put a foot that far down into the deep end of the water, a aquamarine mandible latching itself around his flesh, unable to be wrenched free, so Hero's stuck speaking aloud, but not this time.

His fear is of Victoria, in this moment in time. There is a crap ton of things Hero has actually been afraid of, like thunderstorms, or gigantic crowds, but neither one of those things have made themselves known in the arena. The rain storm from yesterday has all of the hair on his arms stand on edge, sure enough, spooking him out beyond what he'd like to admit, but it isn't the exact same. Victoria is what he's scared of, to find her dead corpse hanging from a tree when he rounds a corner, to put his betrayal of her feelings and of their relationship right in front of him when he could've sat back and let reality sink in, but like Maisey, he couldn't handle it; he's pretty sure none of them know _how_ to handle it, either.

He shakes his head. "I'd rather not share."

Carrion makes a cooing noise in his throat. "Oh come on man, we've all shared. You should too."

Once again, a movement of dissent. "I don't want to."

"He doesn't want to," Valencia hails to his defense, though he is half expecting it. "None of us _have_ to share, but we're doing it anyways. If Hero doesn't want to say anything, then he doesn't have to."

To make sure that the air does not still with disappointment or an awkwardness that is incapable of being truly stopped, Maisey nudges Persephone next to her, the girl from District 2 having been quiet the entire time, not really speaking or showing any sign that she's been _alive._ Occasionally she'll throw the ghost of a smile someone's way, but Hero frankly finds it to be bullshit. Whatever happened to her in the House of Horrors couldn't be _that_ bad, right? Right?

"Anything you'd like to share?" Maisey asks, her tone bright and happy, a juxtaposition to the physical atmosphere settling over the campfire. "We've all gone, and you haven't said anything yet."

The silence around the fire, with only the burning logs to act as the background, it is a period that seems to last eons, but since Hero is counting in his head, it has only been a few seconds. "Myself..." Persephone whispers, her gaze boring into the fire, where the flames dance behind a dark curtain, a gloominess vibrating in the echo of her voice. "Myself..." she repeats.

"Why?" Milor asks. Hero remembers that they had been separated on that day, so their discord between them is a rift that is rather unexplainable, where when Persephone will not open up to even her own district partner, the two being that close... whatever happened in there must be traumatic, even if Hero thinks that some of it is must be blown out of proportion.

Persephone lifts her head up from her knees, still having her arms wrapped around her legs, sleeves pulled up. Dark circles embed underneath her eyes, as if she hasn't gotten any sleep, which is ridiculous, as she's been sleeping on and off all day, and since yesterday, after her original moment of wailing, she is off to sleep, curling up against the side of a building. "Inside that House of Horrors I came across a hall of mirrors. Inside one was, well, _me,_ " there's a liquid clarity behind her voice, a bubble of tears and sadness and melancholy. "It was a completely different version of me. Sagging skin, bleeding face, talons for hands..." a chill blows through the camp, Hero holding tight to his body. "I was attacked by my own evil doppelganger, and hitting it," Persephone makes a face. "Hitting _me_ with the war hammer didn't do anything. I ran for my life and hit another tribute..." No one says anything, but the name is spoken in each of their own heads. Two cannons that day, and Milor claimed the first. _Corvus._ "I bashed his face in with my hammer, even after he begged for mercy..." the girl shudders, a sob escaping her throat, and the other two girls, Valencia and Maisey, both latch onto her from the sides. "I was so scared of my own twisted reflection that I brutally murdered him... all because I was scared. I'm afraid that I'm a monster."

As soon as she says that, the girl hides her face in between her legs once more, audible sniffles and the trembling of her body. It takes two seconds for Milor to leap from his own spot over to his district partner, to place his forehead up against her knees, hands clenched with her hands. Begrudgingly, swaying a bit, Carrion goes over and latches himself with the others to Persephone, and a few seconds after that, Marcus does likewise. Hero stays still, no one doesn't really notice, but that's right.

All huddled together in one ball is _the Careers,_ the tributes from Districts One, Two, and Four like it's supposed to be. Not this Frankish monster by including Hero and Victoria, by including the outsiders.

Hero does not join in on the crying, on the connection of mental anguish, but he does indeed have tears of his own sliding down his face towards Persephone's response. A response of sadness.

In his heart, an echoing drum beat sounds off, but there's nothing to respond to it. A ghost town of emotion, for Hero Slade.

The crickets chirp, the fire crackles, Persephone wails, and Hero survives another day in the 4th Quarter Quell.

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Marcus Pharadane** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ] / **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Persephone Castor** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by santiago poncini20_ ] / **Maisey Rovneay** [ _Submitted by Tiger outsider_ ]

District 5: **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon_ ] / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 10: **Hero Slade** [ _Submitted by curiousclove_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ] / **Alexandra Quinn** [ _Submitted by SparrowBirdEliza_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #30: Ghost Towns. (Can you all believe we're at the 3 double digits now? That's insane, in only four months too, insanity, absolute insanity.) It also does look like, even if there aren't any deaths, that I write these massive 11k-12k chapters, and for that I do apologize, but I think it is only going to get worse from here on out.**

 **I might say this may very well be my favorite arena chapter right now, as even I can appreciate moments of rich and pure character development. Carrion might be getting too close for comfort, Peri and Linden seem to be at an impasse, Alexandra and Caiden have a shifty, shady past, Annabellina has been gifted a ridiculous sponsor item, and our Careers have dark secrets of their own. I am expecting the shift of tribute charts (actually, I'd love to know what they are right now, after this chapter)**

 **It did feel strange not having a death, but that peace doesn't last, right? If things haven't been notched up to a level ten yet, well, brace yourselves, as shit is about to hit the fan and I am beyond excited; not only for this, but for the Capitol storyline as well. The next chapter, #31: A New Leaf, is for the Capitol storyline, so something a _bit_ smaller word count wise that I'll be writing over my Spring Break - woohoo! - and the next arena chapter, #32: Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet... that is when we have shit hit the fan, and don't say I didn't warn you.**

 **I hope you guys review, as just 21 more chapters and we're at the end of this story; I can't believe it. Without such an amazing cast of characters, this wouldn't be happening. I love you all so much; thanks for reading. Have an awesome day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	31. A New Leaf (Capitol Plot VII)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #31: A New Leaf, the next step into our Capitol storyline. I apologize about the seventeen day hiatus, Spring Break was a time for me to decompress from the stressfulness that is my sophomore year of college - ya'll, I'm about to have my Associates, like hell yeah! - and then I totally forgot that I have stories I need to write when my break finished a week ago and I've been back in the routine of things. Last arena chapter there weren't any deaths, we're down to the top thirteen, but right now... we're gonna crank things up to eleven. Buckle in, children! Enjoy Chapter #31: A New Leaf.**

* * *

 ** _Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis P.O.V_**

* * *

This just may be her dumbest idea yet. Lewlyn rationalizes it aloud to herself first, in the shadows where no one can hear her say it, and then in her head because she can. Her current mistake is sitting at her dining room table, auburn hair matching with the roaring fireplace behind them, looking out the window at the night sky. It feels strange, and dare she even think it, almost cathartic to have her brother sitting in her apartment, around her space of a willingness on his part, versus she forcing him and taping him to chairs. She stands in the shadows of one of her hallways, wringing her hands, still wet hair from her recent shower down and resting against her back.

Before she hops into the shower to clean herself off of the arena stink, she emails her brother - Lewlyn does pick up the phone, about to call him, but as she presses the first button in his number, it hits her like a freight truck that he cannot communicate vocally anymore and she's the reason why - that she wishes to speak to him at her apartment. Part of Lewlyn wants to go to his turf, but she's uncertain if that'll scare him more than inviting him. On second thought, however, as she's standing in the shadows and coming to terms with the situation, this apartment, her office over in the business district of the Capitol, and her very existence is one constant reminder in her brother's head of the horrors he's endured. She does not divulge much information as, personally, Lewlyn hasn't exactly gone over exactly what she wants to speak about.

Lewlyn does not feel compelled to dry her hair, so she simply waits by the front door, expecting any minute for him to knock so he can be let in. She is unsure whether or not to believe he will even come, willingly, because he's been under her reign for such a long time, shackled by her cruelty. When the lock of her door sounds like it's being opened from the outside, tears well up in her eyes. Normally anyone else seeing this would automatically deduce the Head Gamemaker crazy or emotionally unstable - she's inclined to agree with both statements, actually - but this is different for her. Despite it seeming odd, in hindsight, a few years ago after he's been mutilated, after her brother is a shell of what used to be Rennie Davis, she gives him a key to the apartment. It is nothing fancy, a simple golden key like nearly every tenant in the Capitol has, but it had been, at that time, a sign of trust from her to him that he would be able to come and go as he partially pleased, but come crawling back to her like a sickly dog.

It has been four days since Rennie's liberation, and Lewlyn had been one hundred percent certain that Rennie had thrown away his key or burnt it; why would he keep it? She doesn't have an answer to that, but for all the terribleness and nastiness she's put him through, there is no way he simply forgot that he had it. Rennie kept his key for a reason, and it is enough to bring Lewlyn to tears, heartbreaking, soul crushing tears.

Even though he is no longer her Avox, Lewlyn lies awake at night looking up at the ceiling, frowning, digging her nails into her arm trying to satiate the need to have him in her arms. She misses her brother. The Head Gamemaker didn't make her brother sleep with her simply because she could, simply because she had this power over him or that she felt the need to be cruel. Lewlyn _wanted_ Rennie, her body would vibrate and shake at the thought of his hands plaiting curves into her shoulders, fingers forcibly opening her spine from below, when their exhales are at an equal pitch... Lewlyn shudders thinking about it now.

He hasn't touched her sexually in nearly a month, and Lewlyn cannot believe she is able to come to terms with the fact that she is touch starved... at how much she misses her _brother._

"Rennie," she says, having gone to hide in the shadows when her brother stepped into the apartment. He whirls around, but for the first time in years Lewlyn realizes that her brother reacted to her voice without feeling scared, his eyes aren't wide, his body isn't shaking with fear and trying to get away from her. Rennie is normal. Absolutely... _normal._ He's sitting rather tall, shoulders back and rigid, his face does not waver emotionally, his hair a roaring flame after a volcanic eruption, brighter than the fire crackling behind him. "You look... you look-" she catches on her own words, Lewlyn choking up a bit, having to press a hand to her throat to properly swallow. "You look great."

Rennie immediately pulls out the tablet, fingers clacking away at the screen. She's reminded, once more, at his old suffering, Lewlyn having to close her eyes so she doesn't fall over. Flashes of copper cover her vision, acidic in taste as they cloak her tongue, and the Head Gamemaker walks over to the other dining room chair - he's at the dining room table - gripping the back of the chair to steady herself.

 _Thank you. You look great, too._

She is compelled to raise an eyebrow, but Lewlyn doesn't want to give too much of herself away, that wouldn't be proper. Brothers and sisters aren't supposed to do that, and Lewlyn is pretty sure that Rennie has never felt any attraction to her, even though she has forced herself upon him time and time again, misconstruing lust for love, but the Head Gamemaker no longer knows which direction is left or right, let alone the feelings of her heart.

"I almost thought you wouldn't come."

Rennie frowns. _Why not?_

Lewlyn opens her mouth, perhaps to insult him - frankly, she didn't have a clue to what she was about to say - because there seems to be times where Rennie can come across as downright stupid. Perhaps it comes with the severe loss of innocence, the thing taken from him in the night besides his speech. She runs a hand down her pant leg, slow and deliberate, her palms starting to sweat. "Because of what I've done to you. I'm- I'm sorry, Rennie," she admits. It took a long time, a lot of healing, and perhaps an insult or two from Bonnie to set her on the right track. "I know that me apologizing and freeing you can't simply right all the wrongs," another deep breath, inhaling through her nose, "But... it's a _start_ ," Lewlyn grimaces.

Her brother frowns, pushing back his seat and walking over to her. Although his actions are not in any way, shape, or form malicious, Lewlyn backs up in her chair regardless. He could be trying to choke the life out of her, to do what she's done to him by smothering him with lustful desires, cruel orders, and a suit doused in copper. Lewlyn flinches when Rennie throws his arms around her in a hug, squeezing tightly, and she curls up into him, her head coddling into the space of neck. Their pulses drum together in harmony, a twisted piece of cloth with a needle pinned down the middle.

He releases the hug first, tears in his eyes, and fingers immediately go to clacking away at the tablet. _There's nothing to forgive you for, Lewlyn._

She opens her mouth again, but this time not to insult him. The Head Gamemaker stops herself from uttering the word, _why_. Nothing to forgive? Lewlyn's head is swimming. It had been evident by the looks on his face, on her twin brother's face, that he hated her, hated what she had done to him, and that it seemed to be a step in the right direction, but to go further and say there's nothing to forgive? Rennie Davis has lost his damn mind.

Instead, she goes for a more diplomatic approach. "I, uh," she looks down at her feet. Rennie's innocence is making this much more difficult than it needs to be. "I started looking into something called PSL. It stands for Panemian Sign Language," and at this, his brow furrows in confusion. "It's so you're able to speak words with your hands instead having to type it into a tablet..." the Head Gamemaker rocks back on her heels. "I've started taking a few lessons, so I can learn how to sign your name and a few other things," Lewlyn grabs his hands, holding them in hers, Lewlyn's icy cold and Rennie's warm with the force of a thousand suns. "I want you to try and learn the language too," he reaches for the tablet, "You don't have to say anything. Just... nod."

Rennie nods, but then reaches for the tablet anyways. _Anything to help you._

Lewlyn raises an eyebrow at that... his statement could honestly mean _anything,_ to help her get past this terrible stump she's been in, but learning a whole new language is to help Rennie, not her. She smothers down her night clothes, having switched into something a bit plainer than the stunning red she had worn all day while watching a butterfly mutt rip out the throat of the male from Five, and the fragile fainting flower from Seven somehow muster enough strength to throw an axe into the spinal cord of the girl from Three. "I'm trying to get better," and this time there is no confused reaction from Rennie, he knows exactly to what she's referring to. "At all of it. Small steps here or there... because let's face it," Lewlyn sighs, giving a half-crazed smile afterwards. "I'm insane..."

 _You're not insane._

He must be lying just for her sake; Lewlyn recalls what she's done to those that used to insult her, with days in prison cells, anemic white uniformed Peacekeepers slamming spiked batons down on people's ankles all while she watched and laughed in amusement. That her is dying, blowing away like leaves to a strong gust of wind. The new her is a new leaf springing with the first rains of March and April, daises in her hair, rainbows following her every step.

"I think everyone is starting to notice that you are no longer in service to me," Lewlyn says. "People will talk."

 _People will talk no matter what, Lewlyn. They'll find something new within a week to discuss and this will all be old news._

"I just- I just want to protect you. To correct my errors from before, as best as I can," the Head Gamemaker frets. It'll be something easier said than done, she's sure, but Lewlyn is used to the vultures circling her, circling Rennie, circling the both of them even before he lost his tongue and she lost her mind, if it hadn't already been gone from the moment she had been born.

 _You don't need to protect me anymore, Lewlyn. I can take care of myself._

" _Oh you sweet idiot, you sweet idiot,_ " Lewlyn coos to herself. " _How wrong you are..._ " but instead of saying that, she lifts a hand to touch his face, he shivering under the touch. She is sure neither one of them could remember the last time they had touched one another's face in a manner as innocent as this, as sweet and soft as this. "Of course, Rennie. You're absolutely right."

Her new leaf is about to begin, and all of Panem will be watching.

* * *

 ** _Master of Ceremonies Pollux Aetos P.O.V_**

* * *

He is surprised when the front door to the Rodney presidential mansion swings open without someone answering the door for him after he knocks. Stepping into the foyer, his dress shoes make ghastly echoes in the expansive hall. None of the lights are on, and instead, hallways are illuminated in candlelight; Pollux is wary of fire, an elemental substance that man has tried to harness after Prometheus broke bread and shattered boundaries with mortals, and no matter how hard society pushes to tame the bright flame, it'll always find a way to bite back ten times harder.

This is the first time since Interview Night that he's left the comfort of his home, spending the hours picking up shards of glass from the floor after he flipped the table at Lewlyn in anger. Whenever he sees her or the bitch brother, rage burns in his veins, and he has to clench onto something so he doesn't cause anymore damage. Pollux continues on walking throughout the mansion; he knows where to go, he's been there countless times.

Pollux finds Bonnie in the living room, sitting on one of the leather couches in the back, sipping a glass of wine. The door to Calhoun's study is wide open but it looks to empty. There's a fire roaring in the fire place, but she's sitting so far back away from it, he isn't sure it is even doing them any good. It's a sweltering day in August. Why do they have a fire going in the first place?

"Where's Calhoun?" he asks.

"Having a night with the boys," Bonnie murmurs into her wine glass, taking another sip, a pearlish colored liquid disappearing beneath a curtain of porcelain lips. He watches her swallow, closing his eyes. Forbidden, all of it; everything in this mansion needs to be touched with gloves on. Bonnie's reference to the boys means her husband, Lance Viel, and the Merviere twins. For reasons unexplained, that group of four men have created a coalition of friendship, something that perplexes most of Panem.

"Doesn't he realize how late it is?" Pollux frowns. The same could be said for why he's meeting with the president's wife at nearly one in the morning when he should be asleep, hugging pillows and drooling on his bedsheets. The rules don't apply to him, no matter what the rest of the country thinks; Pollux Aetos is above that law dramatically.

"Oh, he definitely knows." She shakes her head and the shadows move with her, creeping up along the wall and onto the ceiling, dangling like a spider holding onto a string of its web blowing in tandem with the flowers on the ground. "That doesn't mean he cares and wants to be with his pregnant wife." Another sip of the wine glass.

That confirms it. Pollux heard grumblings for the last day and a half about Bonnie possibly carrying a child, but until one of them - her or her husband - came clear with the information, it is nothing more than hearsay, wives tale gossip to somehow lower the Rodney presidency into the dirt further than it already is. "So you are pregnant."

Bonnie grimaces. "And so I am."

He frowns again, but doesn't want to say anything. It doesn't seem like she's in the mood for his antics or questions. As a matter of fact, Bonnie doesn't seem to be in the mood for anything. Her blonde hair is a tangled mess, like a field of grain tussled by thunderstorm rains, a residue of lipstick smearing perhaps just a bit too far on her left lip than what should be there, eyes flashing out sadness, and when the flickering flames pass over her face from afar, Pollux can make out dried stains where tears had once been on her cheeks.

Immediately he goes to sit down next to her. "What's wrong, Bonnie? You look terrible."

"Gee, thanks, totally didn't know that," she smiles wryly. Bonnie runs a hand through her hair, fingers getting stuck in the locks, in the curls, and she hisses, cussing to herself until Bonnie untangles herself. "Today was a rough day, let's just say that."

"I'm here if you want," Pollux offers himself forward. She invited him to the presidential mansion for a reason, a thousand times more suspicious knowing that Calhoun is out on the town, wherever that may be.

"I'd really rather not talk about it, Pollux. At least, not right now."

"Okay..." his heart sinks somewhat. In the back of his mind, there's a slight whisper that sends chills down his spine. _You don't want to help her because you care about her, Pollux; don't be silly. You want to listen to her problems to hold blackmail over her head and use as ammunition for later. You want brownie points, since it seems like Lewlyn and Rennie have deserted you._

"Speaking of, actually," Bonnie interrupts her statement with another sip of her drink, finishing it and going to pour herself another glass. "What happened to you?"

"What do you mean?" Pollux asks, but then all the water in his mouth dries up. She's indicating to his neck, and he swears inwardly. He thought he covered it up enough, and Pollux consciously flips up his collar to hide his neck some more; he looks absolutely ridiculous, but it is so someone else doesn't see. Bonnie is gesturing at the bruises that are marring his neck, black and blue splotches dotted all over like a ringlet circle, bruises making an archipelago on his pale skin. At the base of his neck, just under his chin, are two faded, but still slightly visible indentions in his throat, the redness beginning to disappear, but noticeable all the same.

He's sure that Rochelle, that blasted girl from District 3 in her interview, with her bluntness and ability to throw people under the bus, saw the bruises when they were fresher, from when they had just been applied. It is just after he nearly chokes Rennie out against a wall after finding out he had just been another piece in the Davis siblings game, whatever that game may be. The fact that he has the power to be the monster Lewlyn must believe he is... and that Pollux turns his hands in on himself to see exactly what he can do.

The pain is freeing.

The pain is glorious.

The pain is relentless and uncompromising in its fury.

Pollux breathes out with euphoric sound waves riding the exhalation, and the power fades out of his fingertips, and then there's the pain following shortly thereafter, after the orgasmic pleasure of choking himself dissipates. A flash of agony that brings the Master of Ceremonies down to his knees, coughing, hacking up blood, and that he has the interviews shortly thereafter. It hasn't been the smartest decision he's ever made, but he doesn't even need hindsight to tell him that.

Bonnie smirks at him, rather an odd facial expression to make at seeing that he's covered in bruises. "Where did they come from?"

"I was jumped," Pollux lies. Even though the president's wife has done some messed up shit in her heyday, there is no way anyone will be impartial to knowing that the man who resembles the face of Panem media intentionally injured himself.

The president's wife smirks again, downing another sip of the wine. Pollux wants to take her glass out of her hand and drink it all himself, but he needs to show some semblance of manners. "I heard over the last few days that there's been witnesses to you choking Rennie Davis before Interview Night..." Bonnie makes a telltale face, leaning back and sinking into the leather.

"All lies, Bonnie."

"Of course they are." Her tone suggests anything _but._

Pollux knows that he inwardly cringes hearing the redheaded Avox's name when it comes out of Bonnie's mouth. He wants to try and get rid of the man's face out of his head; it is there whenever he closes his eyes, because dammit, he's infatuated with that absolute piece of shit. He knows that Bonnie saw him inwardly cringe, as she takes another sip of her wine, her face reading like an open book, clockwork churning inside her brain.

"You and Rennie aren't on good terms, are you?" she asks. "I thought you and him were together."

"We were _fucking_ ," Pollux says crudely. "I don't want to talk about him."

"Too bad," Bonnie smirks. "Because I _want_ to." She shifts herself on the couch a bit closer to Pollux, her eyes sparkling anew with a revitalization of gossip. It is a paradox, a woman in shambles lit aglow over fishwives stories. "You know that Rennie is no longer in Lewlyn's service, right?"

"I'm the first person he told. It's why I choked him, because right after that, he dumped me."

Bonnie laughs. "I love how Lewlyn thinks she can just somehow remove all the shit she's done the last fifteen years. Cut out her brother's tongue, enslave him, force him to have sex with her, and yet somehow her letting him go out of the Avox group is enough to remedy all the pain she's caused?" She shakes her head. "I don't buy it."

Even hearing what the Head Gamemaker has done, seeing that there's some sort of resurgence going about inside Lewlyn, knowing all the crap she's done to Rennie and has gotten away with, somehow... it burns Pollux to the core. It doesn't matter if Rennie is a piece of shit as well, in accordance with his sister, no one should go through that and have their punishes escape unscathed, in power or not. Some new leaf bullshit, and Pollux sees right through it.

"She needs to die, Bonnie," Pollux says. That is how the whole thing started, he realizes, saying it aloud. "I once mentioned to Rennie how he and I would screw right in front of her, and then I'd kill her, for him, because I wanted to." He looks at the president's wife, and she has set her wine down for this. "I was absolutely serious, Bonnie. I'm going to kill her."

Bonnie smiles, lifting her head up, and then nodding in agreement. "I agree."

It seems as if the Head Gamemaker's days were to be numbered... but who would set it in motion? Pollux isn't sure, but he'd be damned if someone else got to her first before he did.

No new leaf for Lewlyn Davis.

No bond or trial or reprieve.

Punishment would come as the form of a steel blade, and when the throat had been freshly slit, dripping with blood, Lewlyn's body would collapse to the pavement under a roar of thunderous applause.

The most watched event in Panem's history; Pollux could envision it now, he holding the microphone and broadcasting to the denizens of Panem that the devil will be losing their head, and Bonnie will hold the woman down, Rennie holding the knife... he can see it play like gorgeous clockwork.

Pollux nods his head. "Let's do it, Bonnie. Let's murder Lewlyn..."

* * *

 **Multiple things at once! First off, woohoo, feels good to be back! No April Fools joke, I promise. Secondly, Sheep Led to Slaughter has passed the 200k word count mark, so give a woohoo for that as well! And... thirdly, that was Chapter #31: A New Leaf, the next step in our Capitol storyline. I will admit that I must be confusing the absolute hell out of you guys, those trying to understand the dynamic of Rennie and Lewlyn - for those that are actually reading and caring about this storyline, might I add - and I can just say that it will all make sense in the end.**

 **It looks like Bonnie and Pollux are going to have something brewing, but you know me, right? Will things happen just because _they_ say it will happen? *shrugs shoulders* You guys will just have to wait and see. The next chapter is #32: Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet, and let me just say, the arena will be cranked to an eleven, and following immediately after that will also be another arena chapter, #33: Friends Close, Enemies Closer, so please hold onto your pillows and pray that your tributes survive, because I'm holding no prisoners, and I'm not holding back.**

 **Please review you guys, you guys have been awesome with it and I want to keep the speed up! I hope you all have an amazing day, and I will see you soon with the next arena chapter. Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	32. Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet (Day 4)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #32: Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet. Last arena chapter, #30, I didn't kill anyone - ya'll, that was so hard to do, you have no idea - and instead, our tributes went _at_ it. Carrion and Maisey have created a rift between themselves out of someone's jealousy, Linden is furious at Peri for killing Rochelle, it turns out that Alexandra is not as innocent as she had made you all believe, Annabellina still losing her mind has been granted a sponsor gift in the form of a flamethrower, and the Careers sat around a campfire pretty much drunk and told the world their worst fears. _Surely that won't bite them, right?_ As I warned you all previously that starting from this chapter, the intensity was going to kick off even further to an 11, so buckle in and get ready. **

**This chapter will also be one that has been musically inspired, this time by a song called Radium by Alex Stein. Play the song when the second point of view character enters a building called the Hall of Mystery; I won't say anymore out of spoilers, and have the song play for the rest of the chapter on repeat (it's around six minutes long or so). Please enjoy Chapter #32: Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet.**

* * *

 ** _Linden Hazel: District 7 Male P.O.V (14)_**

* * *

Breakfast for the morning is a skinned rabbit, nothing seemingly out of the ordinary about it, and a package of grapes that Peri had found inside Rochelle's pocket when seeing if there had been anything on her before the two of them left so the chopper could retrieve the corpse of the dead tribute. Linden tries not to think too morbidly about the fact that the last person to hold the bag in their hands is the same person his district partner killed with an axe to the back of the head. He nibbles on one end of the grape in his hand, an image of the girl from District 3 now stuck in his mind.

He holds the half eaten grape in his hand, swallowing slowly, setting the grape down on the top of his backpack. Linden won't go back and eat the rest; he knows it, and he's ruined his meal. The rabbit is quite good, though, and it even scores him a point in Peri's court, his district partner surprised that he knows how to even do such a thing, regardless of his age. Being homeless has taught him how to fight, how to catch food and eat it without always needing to resort to stealing, and that you can't trust anyone.

Linden flashes Peri a look, his district partner distracted as she watches a tree's leaves blow in the wind. The strength serum pumping in her veins is starting to give her a collection of hair as well, something she wakes up to on the second day, holding locks of soulful fire in her pale hands. It is starting come in thick in certain spots, but Peri tries styling it all to one side, but the wind always seems to want it to be a discombobulated mess. Linden's heart beats in his chest when he looks at her. It used to be out of some strange fascination, perhaps even a crush that could've involved something stronger such as love... but his heart no longer beats in a symphony of romance anymore. What he sees when he looks at her is a killer, how she didn't even _hesitate..._ and that might be what bothers him the most.

Their argument last night sends rivets of shock through his skin, but Linden bites down on his tongue and decides to work past their argument. One of them will be getting out of the arena, but his ability to confidently say that it'll be him is beginning to wane; they both wrote her off good as dead just mere hours before the Bloodbath, and now she's probably as lethal, if not more lethal than any Career, as neither one of them know how far the serum has in terms of its capabilities. He is unsure, had they somehow been in the final two regardless of her being strong or not, if he'd be able to kill her, and now he has to confront that in a whole different situation. _She could kill him._

And to think he might've had feelings for her.

Linden snorts.

He's learned the hard way, with year after year of strife, and not to diminish Peri's sufferings, which must've been miserable, her diagnosis has not been something she's had on her own longer than he has been out on the streets, homeless. Linden knows in the back of his head that it is part of his pride that keeps him living in squalor instead of going to the orphanage, but there is never going to be a day as long as he is alive when a Hazel listens to the word of another adult when they're perfectly capable of making the decisions themselves.

She looks over at him, giving him a half smile. Tensions have smoothed themselves out when the two stop to create camp for the evening, at Linden's request, since he really does not want to sleep anywhere near where the dried blood of Rochelle's remains landed. They don't say much to each other after settling into their separate sleeping bags, but he actually says good morning to her when waking up with the sun; Linden isn't so sure just a year ago if thirteen year-old him would've been able to try and look past their argument and rather give her the cold shoulder.

It has been drilled into his head for what must be the umpteenth time that you do not abandon your district partner, you do not kill them unless you're in the final two, and that they're the best shot you have until the end. That advice is the exception that Linden will listen to; he isn't stupid.

After realizing that the grapes are Rochelle's, Linden stops eating, holding the remaining ones in his hand, it cupped away from him and he's not moving, gaze directed somewhere on the concrete ahead of them.

Peri purses her lips. "You alright?"

He clears his throat, nodding, "Yeah."

She cranes her neck to look at his hand. "You not hungry?"

"Not really," Linden admits, not wanting to say anything further. If he goes into detail on why he isn't hungry anymore, he can guarantee that she'll be on his ass faster than a moth that is attracted to a lampshade. "You can have them," and he extends his hand out to her, dumping the rest of the grapes into her right hand, which she hadn't moved to accept his offer.

His district partner goes to say something, stopping herself in her tracks, Linden's body language rather stiff, blocked, and distant. She looks at the grapes in her hand, at the bag, and outwards, away from where they're staying. Peri places the rest of the grapes, a decent amount of them still uneaten, back in the bag they came in, setting the bag aside. He inwardly prepares himself for what may come next, if her actions are anything to go by, but at this point Linden has no idea who Peri even is, having been fooled all while enjoying his stay in the Capitol that he and she understood one another flawlessly, without amble disruptions.

"Look, Linden, I'm sorry, okay?" she exhales, pinching the bridge of her nose.

Linden looks up at her, eyes impossibly soft, but his voice is confident and unwavering. "Sorry about what?"

He knows that she knows that he knows he's just playing her at this point, grabbing an imaginary tail and running around in a circle, laughing about the misdirection whilst doing it. Part of him just wants to hear her admit it, to hear her swallow her newfound pride and admit what she's done had been wrong. Rochelle Pascal hadn't been a threat, Linden could see the writing on the wall from a mile away. Not only had she been unarmed, she posed absolutely no danger or intention of attacking them. That is what bothers him the most, the thing that Peri keeps throwing in his face, that there won't be other tributes in the arena willing to spare them who have the means to instigate damage. His point goes back to the same thing every time, however, and he'll repeat it till he's blue in the face and a broken record that knows nothing else except how to sputter.

She did it without hesitation, killing, at that point and time, someone innocent.

Peri frowns at him, eyes fliting up to the sky briefly. Though the movement is rather instantaneous, its intentions do not go unnoticed. Linden sees the way her eyes flash in annoyance, regardless if it had been a second or two minutes of lightning; he's gotten under her skin a single sentence in. "You don't have to bullshit with me. You don't want the grapes because they're Rochelle's, and you're still bothered that I killed her."

"You want a medal?" he snarks back at her, and when he does, a bitterness leaves his tongue, an acidity he's never tasted before. Linden is taken aback by it himself, but he does not change his facial expression; he cannot afford to give Peri any sort of leeway in this.

"Arguing about it won't make a difference," she tries another approach, appeasement, but Linden doesn't know how to spell that word so it honestly doesn't matter what Peri is trying to do, it simply won't work. "She's dead, out of the game, and we're one step closer to home."

Linden, this time, has to physically bite down on his tongue, noting her word choice. _We're one step closer to home._ " _You mean yourself, right?"_ he thinks to himself. " _There's no way you're letting me leave this arena alive, I know it. And I don't know what to do with that information anymore..._ " The boy flicks the half-eaten grape he rested on his backpack away, watching it soar into the grass. "I'm sorry," he apologizes - he isn't sorry - while hoping his face is good enough to convince her. "I don't know why it's bothering me so much."

"I'm surprised _I'm_ not bothered by it as much," Peri smiles to herself, but it isn't a smile full of happiness. It is crooked, jagged, shifting in perspective at shift after shift.

That is not something he expects her to say, Linden frowning and tilting his head to the side some. "What do you mean?"

"I did kill someone," she says. "Didn't think I had it in me. I guess me trying to cope with it is trying to rationalize why I just threw the axe instead of letting her go," Peri has the thousand yard-stare in her eyes now, she lifting her head up and looking past Linden. It is as if she speaks without him being there, a chill passing over his body when he realizes this. "I couldn't really hear your voice in my head. Just the thaw of the wind, and the sound of me throwing the axe. You were telling me to stop, and all I heard was white noise," the fragile flower looks down at her hands. "I thought I was going to kill Marcus back at the Cornucopia, but that had been to save your life..." a nervous laugh comes from deep within, "So maybe I do have it in me and because of the serum, I've found a way to get it all out. Perhaps it would've just been a matter of time."

Linden tries to follow her line of thinking, as she's opened up an aspect of herself he didn't see coming. Even though the two of them have been on jovial terms, he not getting close with any other tribute out of the pack of twenty-four - insane to think there's only thirteen now, and eventually it will all spiral down to one - there's been so much not shared between them. He doesn't know about much of the internal conflict in her, conflict he suspects, conflict she may have just unleashed, and there is no way in hell he is going to let Peri know about that time in the rain. He shudders, despite it being extremely hot in the arena, his mind taking him back to that moment in the rain, wet drops sliding down his face, colluding with the dust and the blood and his own tears, and how warm the woman's arms are, how serene her fingertips feel against his chest when she pushes him back onto the ground, a lighting bolt flickering in the back, briefly revealing her face. Lips are a bright cherry red, rouge around her eyes, hair up in some outrageous bun, and it scares the absolute hell out of him.

He has nothing to pay her with, the prostitute, and so she decides to slam a heeled foot into his stomach as her payment after he's struggled to put his pants back on, to wipe the whiteness off of his face and out of his hair, and now he's fighting to catch a breath while the sound of her heels _click-clack_ away on the pavement.

"I'm sorry I couldn't pay you back..." he whispers, and he feels himself lifting his hand to try and call out the woman's name, but Linden no longer remembers it; he's been trying to forget for such a long time.

Something shifts from his side to in front of him, and it scares him, snapping Linden out of whatever trance he had just been. It is Peri, who just finished speaking, and she lowers his arm back to the normal position, scooting closer and closer until their knees are touching. "You okay? You got all spaced out for a second there. I thought I heard you say something and then you just lifted your arm," Peri frowns, but this time it is a frown back to what he has always known, the fragile flower that cares, the fragile flower that is able to push her differences aside and help someone that she's close with.

Linden blinks, shaking his head. She knows too much now, and he didn't want that to happen. _Dammit. Son of a bitch!_

"Yeah, I'm- I'm fine..."

"Are you sure?" she asks, and Peri lifts a hand to touch his face.

He intercedes, grabbing her hand with his so she doesn't have to touch his face. Linden knows why she's doing it; Peri's signature way to disarm someone, to make them lower their guard, it is by touching their face, and at this late stage in the game, Day Four, thirteen tributes left, he's not letting his guard down. "I'm sure, Peri. I'm fine, I promise."

"Who was it?" Her eyebrows are lifted lightly, a genuine curiosity. "I heard something about repayment. Your mother?"

The bitter taste returns again, this time it is the pouring of blood out of his mouth, a stream in which Linden chokes, the saltiness splashes onto the back of his throat. The rain returns, and the smell of copper hits his nostrils, and he has to take a deep breath, once again biting on his tongue to get her face out of his head. The fingernails that dig into his arm, the scratches on his face, the bruises that lacerate his ribcage while she grapples on top of him, and now the face is beginning to meld. The prostitute. Peri. The prostitute. Peri.

His mother is not the woman he sees during that thunderstorm, the one who forces him to have sex with her despite Linden not truly knowing what the hell is even happening.

He nods, closing his eyes, a single, lone tear sliding down his cheek. "Yeah," Linden lies, voice raspy, "My mother."

Again, to think he might've had feelings for her, this wilting rosebud with her axe blades, her cancer cells, and her strength serums. He's been alone for so long, Linden doesn't even know anymore what companionship is like, and especially not with creating some as twisted as those forged in the arena... to be friends with someone only to stab them in the heart days later. Peri's cancer is devastating, but she has her mother and father and best friends to be by her side, to give her that pity she so much hates. Not now.

The two sit there, at their new campsite, stuck on a flowering, blooming hill with a roller coaster running up beside them, hands locked together, and all Linden can think of is how his heart beats fast out of terror that one morning he may wake up with an ice pick wedged in his eye.

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

From how every adult around her has spoken about power, Valencia assumes that the loss of power is something she can physically see happen, as if it is someone's chakra or energy being sapped out of their very essence, and yet she feels none of it in that manner. Valencia knows that the power is shifting some, despite being the one making the calls and creating the next step and the next step after that. It can only be described as a pressure surmounting on her shoulder blades, pushing down, further and further with a preciseness that makes the pain Atlas has to endure by holding up the world on his shoulders more like being swatted on the arm rather than punched across the jaw.

Valencia did not expect the pain to hurt this much. She curls up by the dwindling fire, the others either too intoxicated to hear or simply not caring enough to notice, as she brings her arms to her chest, holding them tight, and shudders, occasionally letting out a free sob here or there. Sometime in the middle of the night, around three in the morning, there's the sound of gravel shifting under someone's shoes, and a light tap on her shoulder. When Valencia rolls over to see who it is, the amicable face of Persephone Castor looks down at her, frowning slightly, but there's a kindness in her eyes that seems to have been vacant for the last few days.

The Career sits up, light hair that sifts in waves down her back, it bouncing off of her shoulders, about to speak, but Persephone cuts her off and simply gives the other girl a hug. Valencia is caught off guard by it, nearly croaking in surprise, which would've no doubt awoken one of the others. Both girls break apart, Valencia initiating it, and she frowns after the fact. She wants to say something to Persephone, since before they had all gone to bed, they all had unleashed some pretty emotional baggage to one another, the Career from Two most of all, but now, looking at her, Valencia would've never assumed Persephone felt any sort of distress.

The air around her is light, now, her eyes shining an illustrious mahogany, and there is no longer some sort of wild fear hiding behind the sockets of anemic white. Valencia does not know if she had the courage to cry like that in front of the others, unable to determine if Persephone's catharsis had been bravery or foolish, but she isn't feeling up to getting in an argument about that. Standing rather emotionless, Persephone places a gentle hand on Valencia's shoulder, before leaning in and giving her a kiss on the cheek. She's been kissed before, by plenty of guys, all wanting to cope a feel while she pats around their groin, but nothing as emotional or friendly as what Persephone gives her, and when the other Career retracts, nodding a sense of goodnight, Valencia's arms are tingling with rivets of shock. Synapses spark and ignite and flare up down her spinal cord, Valencia touching her cheek where Persephone had kissed her.

It hadn't been romantic in the slightest, unless she's misinterpreting everything up to this point, which Valencia hasn't ruled out. She stands there, numb, as Persephone goes back to her spot on the ground, curling up against Milor, who has an arm draped across Carrion's chest, the three looking rather adorable all like that under the flickering of the dying fire. Valencia almost rushes over to shake the female Career's shoulder, to demand why she did that, to demand why she has upset her so, but it'd be stupid to do that. Making a mountain out of a molehill, that is all it is.

Even so, when Valencia returns back to lying down, now hugging her hands to her chest because she's shockingly cold, her nerves are still rattled. No one has ever been gentle with her in that manner, either because she herself hadn't been searching for a companionship that innocent, or that those that have pressed their lips to her face are doing it while her back is up against the headboard of a bed, pants by her ankles, and fingers digging into the empty spots of her soul. Now, in the sunlight, as Valencia leads the pack in perhaps everything except physically, she still touches her cheek every now and then, often glancing at Persephone who is a bit ahead of her, war hammer in hand, head held high, shoulders back. Valencia wonders, but she doesn't dare make the move, to what would happen if the kiss had landed elsewhere, such as her lips?

When everyone had awoken, Carrion, Maisey, and Marcus nursing some rather unfortunate headaches that seemed to have worn off rather quickly, it had been around one or so in the afternoon if the sun's position in the sky had been any indicator. Valencia is packed up and ready to make a move on, sword in hand, hands on her hips. No one fights her when she suggests they move camp again, maybe go and hunt a tribute or two, but that suggestion seems rather rejected than accepted. Having one of the theme park maps, there is a spot on the map that she looks at when the sun rises that has her perplexed.

"Look at it," she points to it with the others huddled around her, all looking at where her finger is. On the map, which has all of the rides labeled and path numbers correctly bulleted, is a section of the arena covered in a gray wash, almost blurred out to it. All that is there on the map is a question mark, colored in yellow, and it is the mystery of it all that gets Valencia's heart beating.

"What about it?" Maisey asks, nose scrunched up. Although Valencia knows that the girl from Four isn't stupid, she isn't very bright either, and whenever she makes a suggestion to do something - a _command,_ rather; Valencia needs to adopt the militaristic language to her speech if anyone is to take her seriously - it is the blonde haired girl that fights her the second she gets a chance to.

"It's unknown," Valencia elaborates, although now the others are simply going to be arguing to argue. "Don't you want to know what is out there?"

"Should we really go exploring?" Milor rubs his arm, frowning.

"Would you rather stay here?"

"I mean-" Carrion starts to interrupt, but Valencia holds a hand up to silence him. She's been terrified about losing power, losing her voice in the Career pack for having the highest training score, and she is not about to lose it now; there's no way she is going to let fear rule over the tributes that are supposed to be the scariest.

"Listen," she says sternly, taking a step back and folding the map in her hands, "There's thirteen of us left; us seven, and six other tributes. Since our numbers are still supremely high," Valencia almost adds a ' _minus Victoria_ ' in the mix, but at Hero's demure expression, those words do not come out of her mouth, "It means we now outnumber the rest. They could all be in an alliance together and we could be taken by surprise and beaten and killed."

"An alliance of Caiden, Colt, Alexandra, Annabellina, Linden, and Peri," Marcus lists off the names, crossing his arms. "We all scored higher than them, and besides Linden and Caiden, the others can't even touch us. I'm not afraid of them. That's what you're scared of?" Valencia wants to punch him square in the jaw. As his district partner, he should be backing her up with every damn decision.

She entertains, albeit briefly, the possibility of sending her sword into his gut, but that should be a last resort for a little bit later in the game; Valencia puts her sword arm behind her back, careful to not dig the blade into her leg, the hilt a point of pressure in the middle of her spine. If she leaves it there, the temptation will go away. "I'm not scared of them, I'm not afraid of them; I'm being realistic. We're a lethal and large alliance, and none of the other tributes are stupid. I want to go and find out what is in that unknown zone. If you don't want to go, you're more than welcome to stay here," it seems as if that will be the action most of them are going to take, Hero and Persephone looking like the exception. Valencia smiles rather cruelly, even for herself, she'll admit, "If you stay, and the place I go to is a safe haven, I am going to make camp. Anyone not there after dark has officially left the alliance."

The smiles dissipate.

 _Jackpot._

"And why would you do that?" Maisey asks, scowling. Ah, ever the thorn in her side.

"Because I want the alliance to continue. I want us all to be in the top seven," she explains, and then, in her head, " _If I beat the easiest enemies in the arena, I didn't earn my victory. If I am going to win, I want to fight the best of the best, and right now, that means us, whether I like Maisey Rovneay or not..._ " which elicits a slight smirk on Valencia's part. "I should be allowed to feel that way."

"And why's that?"

"It's what a good leader is supposed to do," Valencia replies, bringing the sword round front, daring anyone to speak against her.

Fortunately for her, as she isn't sure how prepared she is in the practice of bloodshed, no one argues back, and they begin to pack up as well. Backpacks hoisted, campfire long gone, they look one last time at the obelisk and begin their march. Looking at the map again, Valencia notes that with the way it seems to be designed, there is a long passage around the outer rim of a lake a bit away from them which leads to the unmarked zone, or a direct passage through a place called the Hall of Mystery. She does not want to be caught out after dark in an unknown part of the arena in a place none of them wanted to end up at; a good leader has to make the hard decisions for the good of the group, for the well-being of the company, and it is in part of the underlings to swallow their pride and follow her.

They begin to reach the fork in the road, where it looks the passage around the lake could take an hour or two, maybe even longer, given the vastness of it on the map. Valencia isn't quite sure of the time and distance relationship between passing through a building that does not seem super massive. From what she can deduce, the mystery zone is maybe another thirty minute walk past this hall; a plain and simple shortcut.

"Do you think we should go through there?" Hero asks the rest of the Careers, resting on the hilt of his own weapon, Valencia eyeing it carefully. One slip, and he could slice his throat open. "If what Valencia says is right, then that means we're cutting down on walking time, and we won't be caught out in the open in the dark."

"What if we swam across?" Carrion suggests, walking a bit away from them to the side where they can view the lake. Immediately, down in her gut, she hates the idea, she hates every notion of what that could mean.

Milor shakes his head vigorously. "I don't know how to swim, and we don't know how deep it is."

"Nor do we know what's in it," Persephone adds.

Valencia frowns, noting that Marcus has been strangely quiet about it all, almost as if he doesn't have an opinion whatsoever, if his blank facial expressions are anything to go by. Rather, she sees that he's fidgeting, fingers constantly drumming against the metallic wing of the bow, sometimes pulling an arrow out of the quiver and plucking the strings. She clears her throat, looking away from her district partner, and at Carrion, who rejoins the group. "It seems too deep anyways," the male from Four says, crossing his arms. "Even if I could swim it, that's a large lake and I'm not a superhero. I'd have to stop and who knows what'd happen," he nods at her. "It'd be best to go through the shortcut."

She smiles at his acceptance of her idea; the world seems to go perfectly fine when everyone else follows her orders. They all line up, almost like a cavalry charge, staring at the entrance of the Hall of Mysteries. Valencia is about to take the first step to lead the rest in when she pauses, looking at Persephone. Her ally is standing a bit more rigid than the rest, eyes slightly cloudy, but there isn't a betrayal of confidence on her face yet. Valencia notices the breathing, how her chest rises and falls perhaps a bit too abruptly, and Milor picks up on it too, crossing over Carrion and to her.

The girl is so caught up in not losing power and not knowing how to read the signs of everyone around her that she forgets the one person in the alliance who the arena has already dealt cruelly with before. Persephone is locked up in another building in the arena, tormented by a devil version of herself, and forced to kill another tribute to escape... and all Valencia sees, which she realizes as guilt floods over her, is that people are starting to listen to her.

"Are you okay with going in there, Seph?" Milor asks first, his hand barely ghosting over Persephone's, fingers lightly locking together.

It takes a bit for Persephone to respond, and the other Careers have gone silent, so the air around them is quiet save for the girl's exhalations. "I think I should be okay. Besides, we're all together."

"It's called the Hall of Mystery," Hero adds, trying to be chipper - _bless his soul,_ Valencia thinks to herself - and he adds a bit of a step into his tone. "Mystery sounds exciting! You even said that the other place dealt with horrors. This doesn't sound terrifying at all!"

Persephone quirks a light smile at the boy from Ten's cheerfulness, shaking her head, grasping Milor's hand firmly. "Alright, I can do it. We can go in."

Without wasting too much time, no longer spending any time dillydallying, Valencia, with Marcus hot on her heels, the others falling shortly behind them, crosses the realm between light and shadow, walking straight through the Hall of Mystery's door. There's no ominous gust of wind to harken their arrival, rather just their heavy breathing, the smell of sweat and rubber, and a rather, if Valencia is honest with herself, ominous lack of light.

So far so good...

Valencia has her sword out in front of her. There must be something to the place regardless of its seemingly harmless name. The Gamemakers would not create a shortcut in an arena without there being a catch; she just hopes the catch is playful and for once not something that will kill them. About a minute later, as they are more or less simply shuffling down a dark hallway, she pauses, raising a hand. Everyone else stops moving, Marcus nudging her lightly in the back with his bow.

She doesn't say anything yet, the others holding on with bated breath before she speaks. Valencia tilts her head a bit, frowning. "Listen... do you hear that?"

They all shift forward some. It is very faint, very, _very_ hard to hear, but Valencia hears it. A slight drumming noise, and it seems to get higher in pitch, the beats stronger and stronger. A blip of something passes by a corner, and at the faint end of the hallway, is a beam of light pouring out onto the floor. "What is it?" Milor whispers, sword clenched in hand, armed and ready to go.

Valencia shifts her tongue inside her mouth, taking an extra step forward. "Sounds like music. Seems to be drums, I think." So they have some sort of music accompaniment whilst trapezing through the Hall of Mystery; she can deal with this.

The Careers advance onward down to the end of the hall, reaching the pillar of light. The only way to go after that is right, in direction of the light beam. The closer they get to it, the louder the drumming gets. Valencia hears, faintly, on the melody, something swiping left and right above their heads, a vibration of sorts... she thinks it's music, but it must be the strangest noise she's ever heard. As they all crowd by the door, they gasp, Valencia stepping into the next room slowly, trailing her sword behind her.

The hall opens up to a massive room, at least double the size of their own apartments back in the Capitol. The drumming is at its peak, blasting out of what she assumes to be speakers in the far corners on each side. Lasers and flashing lights accompany the walkway, amaranthine and emerald shafts of light pillaring everywhere; Valencia's body is divided into three colors: the darkness of the hallway, green, and purple, and when she moves her arms, the light follows with her. Next to her, Persephone clams up, and she can feel her body tense.

In a faint red glow at the end of the hall, Valencia can make out an exit sign. Staring at the Careers is themselves, and if Valencia looks a bit to her left and a bit to her right, there's more reflections of themselves. A hall of mirrors. The Hall of Mysteries is nothing more than a hall of mirrors... and that is why Persephone's breathing hitches in her throat. Listening to the tune playing over the speakers, Valencia's heart beat begins to increase, all the hair on her arms standing up. The music is ominous, a darker drumming that resembles the beat inside her skull.

"A mirror maze..." Persephone whispers, grabbing Valencia's arm, nails digging into her skin.

"We'll be okay. We should just..." she swallows heavily, "We should just stick together..."

A few steps forward, Valencia hisses in pain, she having walked directly into one of the mirrors facing them. Turning to the right, six more copies of her look back at her, and she jumps outwards in the skin. Each reflection leads to a different angle, which, if she follows that path, brings her to a different mirror. Through it all the red glow of the exit sign appears in the back of the picture, and she starts to sweat. It's extremely hot in the room, compared to the outside, but that might be because there's seven of them in what seems to be quite an enclosed space. The ceiling isn't that tall, maybe only a foot or so taller than Carrion, and he's the tallest at a bit over six feet.

She hits her head once again, and Valencia slashes outwards with her sword at the mirror. It makes an awful screeching noise, in which Persephone almost leaps into Milor's arms. The mirror is undamaged, and thankfully, so is her sword; there isn't even a line where she struck the mirror. Valencia leans into it, touching it, and it is as if the mirror bends with her, the glass pushing in and bouncing back. She flinches, taking a step back, going to touch it again, when Marcus appears by her side.

It is the tip of an arrow appearing just by her right eye that makes Valencia move over, she not even hearing his footsteps over the music. The vibrations are starting to hurt in her skull; there doesn't seem to be any words to the music, but all she can focus on is the drumming. Looking back at the others, Maisey and Hero are rather guarded, while Carrion and Milor and Persephone are locked arm-in-arm. She turns her head to look at her district partner; his bow is drawn, and Marcus is loosely holding onto the end of an arrow.

"Do you see that?" he whispers.

"See what?" she whispers back, surprised to even be able to hear him over the song. Valencia tosses a fearful glance over at Persephone. The last thing any of them need is to freak out.

"You don't see it?" Marcus asks, and Valencia's blood turns to ice. She's never heard him sound this terrified of anything, not even when he shouts her name back at the Cornucopia. "It's down the middle... a black shape..." he tightens his draw on the arrow. "I'm going to go check it out."

"No..." Valencia's heart rate increases, and panic begins to rise in her throat. They should've never walked into the building. "We need to stick together."

Her words fall on deaf ears, as Marcus advances, and she's calling his name. The others look around, noticing that he's not there, and it is Milor that joins her side next, hands clenching and unclenching around the hilt of his sword, which he has raised up, the tip just barely poking into the ceiling. Valencia is trying to think back to how the mirror seemed to pulsate around her touch, but now her mind is trying to find Marcus in the mirror maze.

All she sees is their own reflections, nothing more. Did Marcus actually advance forward... _or?_ Maisey is about to whisper something when there's a roar that seems to come from ahead of them. _Marcus._ It's his scream, and he's screaming at the top of his lungs, and oh my god it is the worst sound she's ever heard. Something seems to fall over ahead of them, but Valencia can't make anything out except themselves and that's it. Shortly after his scream hits the mirrors, which only makes the noise worse as they constantly keep bouncing off of the surface, waves colliding with waves, comes a guttural screeching noise, a noise that is certainly not of this world.

"Marcus!" Valencia screams, taking a step forward, but Milor holds her back.

"We need to go!" Maisey yells at the others, advancing a bit to the right of the group.

"But... but-" Valencia starts to say something, but the guttural roar of the blackness that Marcus must've seen interrupts her.

However, it is Carrion that frowns, keeping everyone at bay. "Wait a minute..."

"What?" Persephone hisses through clenched teeth.

As Carrion muses, Maisey turns to look behind herself, and Valencia copies her. The way back is no longer the way back, where instead it is a new set of mirrors situated in a half circle... they can't go back. They can't escape. "If Marcus just ran into a mutt... where's the cannon?"

Valencia mouths the words he's saying, and then her eyes widen, looking back towards the direction Marcus went. " _Where's the cannon..._ "

The answer to their question is indeed a cannon, just not Marcus's. As Maisey turns back around, mouth open to mention that the way back has disappeared, something sails through the sky, making a whistling noise as it rushes by. One second, there's nothing there, and the next, an arrow is pointing out from Maisey's chest, her sentence dissolving into a croak of bubbling syllables, blood spilling out of her chest.

A second arrow finds her skull, downing the girl from District 4, and after it, a cannon.

"Scatter!" Valencia screams.

Arrow after arrow seems to sail over their heads, reflecting off of mirrors. She yelps in terror as the back part of an arrow lightly skims her arm, one of the feathered pieces cutting across her arm at a rapid speed. The drumming reaches a fever pitch, more light seems to engulf the room, and she is unsure who is screaming now, as Valencia curls up into a ball, her throat raw. In the corner, Hero is the same, hands over his ears, standing up straight instead of sitting down.

All Valencia can hear now is her panicked voice in her head.

" _Oh god... what have I led them into?_ " she thinks to herself, horrified.

* * *

 ** _Hero Slade: District 10 Male P.O.V (15)_**

* * *

The moment Maisey falls back, an arrow in her chest and an arrow in her head, Hero unleashes a scream that doesn't just come from his throat, but deep down in his soul. Everyone scatters in terror at Valencia's command, all except Hero. He stumbles back into a mirror, hitting his head, something sticky seeming to congeal when he does so, but Hero is constantly screaming, screaming over and over again until his throat begins to burn from the exertion of air. His eyes will not leave Maisey's body, but it isn't Maisey anymore. It's Victoria, he's staring at Victoria Armstrong, the girl he loved for so long... he's looking at her dead body.

Even if he squeezes his eyes shut, her face remains, just like what he told Marcus... she won't go away, his precious Victoria. That is not Maisey's body lying on the linoleum floor, but his old Tori, his best friend, his soulmate, with her mousy, curly brown hair resting up at her shoulders, arrows protruding from her body, and blood beginning to pour out from both wounds. Movement seems to pass over in the distance, but all Hero can do is stare horrified at the dead girl, his dead district partner who he just watched die, hands tense from the bow he just fired.

He races over to her, tears beginning to spill down his face. This wasn't meant to be, this isn't how they were supposed to go. He knows this, the two were to make the finals and he'd sacrifice himself for her because that is what friends are supposed to do for one another, that is what people who love one another would do for each other, and he loves her, _loved_ her until when he'd give his dying breath. He brushes a lock of Maisey's hair out of the way, but it isn't the girl from Four he's looking at, it's Victoria, with her limbs all splayed out underneath her in a grotesque manner, head seemingly twisted around twice with a broken neck... but where is the blood coming from?

Hero's down on his knees, the song from above starting to get louder and louder, and her body is starting to mush together with his hands, skin transforming into flab that he is unable to hold up, he struggling to try and lift her into his arms. She is not supposed to leave him this way, that had not been part of the plan, that hadn't been a component of the plan either one of them discussed, and Hero's tears are hot on his face, scalding liquid droplets that fall into the pool of blood he is kneeling in. It seems as if he is all alone in the hall of mirrors, just him and, him and Victoria, while he sobs over the wrong dead body.

Her face is freezing cold, but Hero doesn't truly know anymore. He rocks back and forth with Maisey's body in his arms, but the face that he looks back at it doesn't make sense anymore. He killed her, he killed Victoria, and he isn't even remorseful about it one bit. How terrible of a human being must he be? Moving her, which moves him, causes squelching underneath his feet, lasers passing over the blood pool and cutting lines into it that make distinctive zones. He brushes a thumb over Maisey's lips, but it is Victoria he sees, it is Victoria he touches.

"Come on," he mutters under his breath, lips sputtering together as he tries to control his sobs. "Come on Tori, come on... don't do this to me. Please don't do this to me... don't leave me," Hero cries, bringing her head to his chest, lowering his to sob up against. "I'm so sorry I killed you. I'm so sorry I didn't help you when we turned against you. I'm so sorry..."

There's no response, not even one in Hero's heart, as he rocks back and forth with her clutched to his chest. He'll never be able to get that look out of his head, no matter how long he lives, seeing her eyes widen in fear, taking a step back towards the bush for hands to reach out of the darkness and grab her. It is his hands that reach out behind the foliage, the ones that grab Victoria's neck. She feels so puny in his grip, the way her body trembles, and then his hands roam up to her head, one at the back and one at the front. With a twist, and a sickening snap, her body falls limp and lifeless, while he leans in and hisses in her ear.

She's pleading with him, pleading with this monster to let her live, to not listen to the machinations of the Capitol, but Hero is the past the point of forgiveness. She's betrayed him, Victoria has stabbed him in the heart and twisted the knife all the while smiling as she does it. She doesn't even watch when he falls down, gasping for breath as blood pours out of his mouth and leaves his body, instead sneering down at him. Oh, what they could've been... oh what they could've been, but now, instead, he's dying, an she's dead, in his arms.

Hero lowers his head to Maisey's chest, trying, trying so hard to revitalize breath back in the girl's lungs, head moving over the arrow. "Don't do this to me Victoria. I can't lose you... I can't lose you," he cries, hugging her to his chest again. He won't even remove the arrows, his hands seem to be unable to go anywhere except underneath the corpse and to hold her up. The blood, her blood, Victoria's blood, his blood... it's all mingling together, and he's covered in it, arm hair matted to his arms underneath all this red in his ledger, the kills he caused, the way he laughs as he watches his district partner and the woman he thought he loved be devoured by some monster in the bushes.

There's a discernible sound behind him, which causes Hero to perk his head up. They sound like footsteps, but he isn't super sure to what it exactly is. "Leave us alone!" he roars out, though his voice is hardly anything but intimidating, the cause he's rooting for. "Leave me with Victoria, please!" he looks down at her. "You can't leave me, I love you. Come on, open your eyes!" he shakes her vigorously. "Open them! Please!"

The footsteps seem to get closer and closer, and Hero finds himself cradling Maisey's body in front of only one mirror, someone standing behind him. Hero looks up, hands going numb underneath Maisey's corpse, and he looks up at the unforgiving, cold eyes of Marcus Pharadane, who is leering behind him, bow on his back, a blade in hand. Marcus grabs the back of Hero's head, but it isn't painful.

" _Oh, please don't cut my hair..."_ Hero pleads to himself, although he does not speak aloud. " _Victoria told me that she loved playing with my hair. My mother and father say my hair is the best part of me... Hector and Arizona told me I'd make sponsors based on my hair. Please don't cut my hair, Marcus._ "

Hero does not have his hair cut, luckily for him. Marcus draws a blade quick and fast across Hero's throat, the boy unable to even process what happens to him as blood splatters the mirror in front of him, Marcus forcing the kid's head back against his leg as he bleeds out, choking on the crimson river pouring out of him. The blade cuts through the boy from Ten's neck like wrapping paper, and he finishes sawing, Hero's body flopping over on top of Maisey's.

All Hero can process is pain, but where the pain is coming from, he's not sure.

He's desperately trying to crawl towards Victoria, towards Maisey, to grip her hand in death, but his body is unable to move.

The world goes black, and his fingers lay limp, inches away from comfort.

The drums beat on.

* * *

 ** _Carrion Bastion: District 4 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out. Carrion repeats those two instructions to himself over and over again, running into mirror after mirror as he tries to find his way out of the Hall of Mystery. He's lost Milor in what seems like hours ago of wandering through the mirror maze, his boyfriend's hand no longer physically there amidst all the screaming. He screams Milor's name once or twice, but it is lost in the thaw of information; no one is going to hear him at this rate. Carrion is also luckily uninjured, and it is the sight of Maisey on the ground, not even getting one last word in before she dies, perhaps even unable to register what happened to her before the second arrow finds her head.

He does not expect to scream when he watches her fall, but he does, and Carrion isn't even upset with himself as he does it. He's seen Deacon die, he murdered the kid for hell's sake, at the Cornucopia, but even then, since Carrion broke the boy's neck, there hadn't been any blood, and the death seemed instantaneous... Maisey's must've hurt and there hadn't been any semblance of recognition that she had been shot. Just ten minutes ago, he's certain, his district partner is alive and questioning Valencia's choices, questioning what crazy dog chase they've been left on, and he knows that she must've caught onto what he noticed himself, finding a way out.

It's arrows sticking out of his district partner's body, and there is only one single person in the entire arena that uses a bow. While panic is flowing through Carrion's veins, his muscles move with the intention of anger, rage that expels motion outwards. _Marcus Pharadane..._ that lousy son of a bitch just killed his district partner, trying to murder the rest of them. He is booted from the alliance voluntarily, and since he saves Valencia's life, he's given a pass... Carrion cusses to himself, resting up against a mirror. He should've seen some sort of betrayal coming, far earlier than after the man has played them all somehow. There had been no beast inside the hall with them, no Capitol creation. The monster had already been among them from day one.

Carrion is afraid of dropping his spear somewhere in this mirror maze, and then he'd be completely screwed. There's all sorts of movement going on in the shadows, black silhouettes dashing around under the lasers and light shows. The song playing over the speakers seems to be in a continuous loop, and whenever there's a drum beat, Carrion feels his heartbeat pump along to it. The raining of arrows has stopped, that either means Marcus is no longer inside the maze with them, or he's run out of things to shoot and will be on the prowl.

He has no idea if any of the others are still stuck inside, or if it is just him. He hopes that Valencia, Milor, Persephone, and Hero got out or are in the process of getting out. Over the noise, he isn't sure they'd actually hear a cannon. He wants to win the Games fair and square; beating your opponent through dirty-handed tricks does not speak to him whatsoever. Whatever Maisey had been going to say is lost on him now, her words will never come into fruition. The banging of the drums is bringing back Carrion's headache, and he groans, bringing a hand upwards to clench his head in pain. Sometimes the room seems to distort to the music, but Carrion knows somewhere in the ends of his mind that it is just the alcohol from the night before that is doing this, the room isn't actually spinning, the room isn't actually bending in warps of space time. It is all a hallucination.

The Career presses himself up against a mirror, sliding alongside it, there being a slight squeak to his path, but that doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. If anyone or anything is to rush at him, projectile or person, he'll see it, and jab his spear at the foreign foe. It is on a attack first, ask questions later basis. Whenever there is a chill of air on his left hand, it means he is no longer touching the mirror and there's a vacant space. Forever, as he looks, the glow of one of the exit signs appears above his head, and that is where he is to go.

Over the music, if Carrion cranes his head, he can hear someone crying, someone muttering to themselves. He frowns, trying to still breathe in and breathe out, to listen to what his mentors back in District 4 told him. It sounds like someone younger, and the only young tribute out of the Career pack is Hero by two years under Valencia and Maisey... _just Valencia,_ Carrion has to correct his thoughts. Carrion wraps around one mirror, and freezes.

He's back to where they had all started, and there are three figures in front of him, Carrion's heart rising into his throat. Maisey is dead on the ground, the linoleum floor stained a putrid crimson, and he can smell the scent of blood, the scent overwhelming the muskiness of the mirror maze. It is Hero that is holding her, cradling her in his arms, doing the sobbing, and Carrion's heart breaks. He can just barely make out the words that he's saying, the poor boy crying over his - Carrion's - district partner and Hero thinking it is his own.

Carrion's heart begins to beat faster, but he is unable to move as he sees that the third figure isn't anyone friendly... not anymore. He can see Marcus's reflection in the mirror of one that is angled to the right somewhat, but despite that, the male from Four is not in that reflection so Marcus cannot see him. The glint of something silver dances down by Marcus's leg, and Carrion's mouth goes dry. He screams the boy from Ten's name, but the cry goes unheard as he watches in horror as Hero's throat is slit from ear to ear, held back by the male Career as he bleeds out all over the mirror, before his body plops forward, twitching just barely.

A roar of blood overwhelms the rest of Carrion's senses, and all he can see is red filling his vision, an agonizing surmounting of pain on his forehead. Copper, copper and more copper. Wind rushes in Carrion's ears, the sound of the song playing above that fuels the fire to his headache distorts, and his feet seem to be barely touching the ground as he runs.

Carrion takes off at Marcus, running at the other Career, jumping atop him with a roar, spearhead in hand. His body hits Marcus's and the two go falling to the floor in the pool of blood, their bodies splashing into the cardinal sea. His chest hits the bow shouldered on Marcus's back, causing a little sting of pain, but is second to the rage Carrion is feeling as his body trembles.

The impact of his body hitting Marcus's cause both of the weapons clenched in their hand to scatter, his spearhead landing by Maisey's feet, the knife flying elsewhere. Shadows seem to move on the edge or the corners of Carrion's vision, which must be one of the other tributes escaping, but Carrion isn't focused on that. Before Marcus can recover, letting out a groan, Carrion punches him in the face. He misses a bit, the room seeming to shift to the left some, and his fist collides with the other boy's cheek, not the nose like he had been aiming.

Marcus tries lifting his leg to knee Carrion in the chest, but the male from Four's anger far surpasses that. He punches again, this time hitting the boy square under the jaw, which bucks Marcus's head up, blood starting to dribble down his chin. Lasers pass over both of them, and the song seems to turn off, so it is just the sound of both boys punching each other. Carrion misses another one of his punches, Marcus pushing upwards with all of his might. His fingers barely hold onto the other Career's jacket, but the push is stronger than he is at this point and time, Carrion falling off of the other boy's body, head hitting a mirror.

He groans in pain, holding his head groggily. While he tries to shake the spots out of his vision, Marcus gets to his feet, loading an arrow, pointing it at Carrion. His eyes widen, and he dives out of the way as the arrow soars over his head, missing him and hitting the mirror. The glass wall cracks where the projectile hits it, but that the fact is lost on Carrion as he leaps past another fired shot, picking up his spear. Trying to judge the shot in the dark isn't what he is good at, Carrion vaulting forward with his weapon, it leaving his hand.

It stabs Marcus in his right hand, the boy shouting in pain and dropping the bow in surprise. Carrion races forward again, to collide into Marcus, throwing him back against another mirror. The Career from District 1 falls straight through the mirror, he unleashing another scream as shards of glass enter his back. Carrion jumps over the broken window pane, but in Marcus's fall, he picks up his knife, holding it outwards. Carrion outstretches a hand to grab the boy's neck, but instead his arm is sliced open just below his right bicep. The pain momentarily stops Carrion in his tracks, he hissing through the agony.

Marcus grabs Carrion by the lapels of their uniform, grabbing him and slamming him into another mirror. Carrion's head breaks through, and he can feel, just barely, a slight prickling on the underside of his neck where a glass shard still remains. Marcus grabs his throat, pushing downwards, and the pressure gets stronger and stronger. Carrion growls through clenched teeth, trying to strain against the push downwards, as he is not going to die via a shard of glass against his head. Marcus is reaching behind him, probably for another shard of glass to rip off another mirror, but his feet seem to be slipping on the linoleum floor now slick with Hero and Maisey's blood.

Carrion lifts his right foot up and slams it down on Marcus's right foot, the sudden force of pain causing him to release his grip. He then kicks Marcus in the chest, body barely holding himself up. Marcus reaches down for an arrow out of the quiver that is now on the floor, holding one in his hand, swiping outwards as Carrion approaches. He almost nicks the other Career's shoulder, getting gutsy and swinging out wide, missing again. Carrion catches Marcus's wrist this time, squeezing harder than he ever has, and it sounds like something breaks in the boy from One's wrist. Marcus hisses in pain, dropping the arrow which clatters to the blood soaked floor.

He weakly tries throwing his left hand out to grab onto anything, but Carrion grabs all of his fingers in one grasp. Marcus tries muttering something, but it is all incoherent to the thaw of blood in Carrion's ears; he hears nothing, there is no remorse to give to an old ally who has now killed two others in the alliance. This isn't just for the competition, for the Games; it is vengeance, it is personal. Carrion twists Marcus's fingers down and back, all five breaking at once. Marcus screams again, downing himself to one knee, another plea escaping his lips, but there's no mercy to be given out today.

The Career from District 4 grabs Marcus by the shoulders, and twisting him around, throws him forward back in the direction of the broke mirror he had collided with moments earlier. There is nothing but air for Marcus to hold onto, and he lets out one last yell. He lands primely on the shard of glass sticking out, a laser passing over it, amaranthine light spilling downwards onto the shard. It enters right underneath his chin, probably stuck inside his mouth, and there isn't even a croak of pain that comes from Marcus when he lands.

Carrion walks over, and ahead of them, in a straight line, is another mirror where he can see the picture as clear as he can. Marcus is trying to move off of the spike, it not having entered his brain, so there's a bit of life left in him, a bit of a struggle to contain and hold onto. Carrion grabs his hair, the little of it there is to hold onto, and the fear is evident, glowing from Marcus's eyes. Carrion pushes Marcus down further onto the shard of glass, and this time he exerts enough force that the shard now pokes just barely out of the other Career's head, his hands falling slack to the side.

"You didn't show Hero any mercy," Carrion hisses. "You killed my district partner," he adds. "You betrayed us. There won't be any mercy from me!"

Marcus's body eventually begins to stop fidgeting, except for the occasional twitch as the shard must be poking up against the part of the brain that controls the movement of the body. Carrion's heart is hammering in his chest, blood pouring out of the wound in his arm, a few droplets seeming to coagulate in his hair from breaking through two mirrors, and his entire body aches.

The song comes back onto the speakers, as if had been there the entire time, and the lights and lasers continue to flicker. Through the Hall of Mystery the Careers entered, and thanks to Carrion, the Careers got out.

Somewhere, in Carrion's heart, as the room spins, he can hear, like a clap of a thunderstorm, or the opening to an orchestral evening, is the boom of three cannons. They pale to the roar inside his head, and he stumbles back away from Marcus's dead body, the rage leaving his fingertips in a flight, and he collapses back onto the floor, sliding next to Hero and Maisey's bodies.

He holds a hand weakly to his chest, closing his eyes.

"I'm sorry..." he whispers, not just to Hero and to Maisey, but to Marcus as well. "I'm so sorry..."

All he can see now is the dance of skeletons behind his eyes, and covering them, a coat of purple, green, and a freshly added layer of blood.

* * *

 **13th: Maisey Rovneay, 17, District 4 Female. Killed by Marcus Pharadane of District 1. Created by Tiger outsider. Well, it is a bit ironic, eh, Tiger? One of your tributes killed the other remaining tribute you had. She was our third point of view in the entire story from the tributes perspectives, on our first train ride, and I honestly loved her from the moment I wrote her. There was a whole lot to unpack with her character, and man, you guys either hated her or loved her, there hadn't honestly been much of an in-between. A human side did indeed exist underneath her naivety, under her insane mind, under her expressive layers was a softer side, and a rather intelligent side, but it caught on too late. Carrion avenged you in the best way possible; he made Marcus feel pain. I will most definitely miss writing you; you were the death I was hating to inevitably reach.**

 **12th: Hero Slade, 15, District 10 Male. Killed by Marcus Pharadane of District 1. Created by curiousclove. And another district is gone, and I must say that receptively, Hero and Victoria were the most lukewarm received pair of tributes I believe, as some liked you and her, others didn't. You, Hero, have had more growth than her, and made Top Twelve... and I honestly shed a few tears writing this last point of view, hence the title of the chapter, the 'Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet'. Originally, had Victoria not been eliminated by the tribute vote-off, I would've had Victoria die in Maisey's place, and Hero would've cried over her body instead. I will also miss writing from your point of view, as I think you so far have had the greatest character arc of the tributes that have died so far. Carrion avenged you as well.**

 **11th: Marcus Pharadane, 18, District 1 Male. Killed by Carrion Bastion of District 4. Created by Tiger outsider. Sorry, Tiger, your characters are all gone now. This is not where I originally had you, Marcus, but with how things have ended, with your arc and the play I had you make from stealing Hero's sponsor gift, it needed to enter the field at some point. Had you been lucky, you might've eliminated every Career stuck in that maze. You hated killing, but came to a realization at some point that the victim needs to become the fighter eventually if you wish to win the Games. A potential villain, which many of the readers saw... but maybe not in this way. The Careers have taken a hit today, and you fought every step of the way.**

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Persephone Castor** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by santiago poncini20_ ]

District 5: **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon_ ] / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ] / **Alexandra Quinn** [ _Submitted by SparrowBirdEliza_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **Well... ladies and gentlemen, this is the first arena chapter out of all of them that I couldn't wait to write, and that was Chapter #32: Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet. I was so excited for it that I literally wrote this in two days, and I am back ladies and gents. When I said that the arena was going to be taken up to eleven, this is what I meant. Three character deaths in one chapter, all in one single area, seen by three different points of view... I'm insane, I know. I wanted to tell people, you readers and submitters, about this so badly that I would have to literally bite my tongue to not give any of this away.**

 **We are down to ten tributes, and only Districts 2, 7, and 11 have both district partners alive, the others down on their one leg. District 10 is the fifth district wiped out, underneath District Eight, Nine, Six, Three, and now Ten... and which will fall after that? In the standings, Marcus has the most kills with three - would you believe it? The guy who hated killing, which he really did, has the most kills - and some tributes don't have any, while the ones alive have one or two, with Carrion nipping on the heels.**

 **I would really appreciate a review on this chapter, guys, and I hope you listened to the song Radium by Alex Stein over the chapter whilst reading. If you haven't yet, I suggest you go back to when Valencia and the rest of the Careers enter the Hall of Mystery, as it is supposed to lead up to the end of Carrion's point of view. The very first time I heard the song, I planned this arena scene out to it, and boy, it got my heart racing as well. Beyond that, some of you guys, whether you have been busy, or simply forgot, I have no way to know if you've been reading, and I think every character left alive has a damn good shot at becoming victor. Our Career pack of seven has just been downsized to four by sabotage, and that means there are more leveled playing field stakes.**

 **The next chapter, #33: Friends Close, Enemies Closer, is going to be another arena chapter, this time focusing on Night 4 with another round of point of views from the tributes. The Capitol storyline will be returned to on #34, and subsequently after that more arena chapters and more Capitol chapters. I am in the last month of the semester, and I will hope to get more than three chapters out this month unlike March, which was more a personal disappointment to me than you guys, I take it. Besides that, again, I hope you all review, and I will see you all again very soon with Chapter #33: Friends Close, Enemies Closer. I love you all so much! Have a great day! Bye!  
**

 **~ Paradigm**


	33. Friends Far, Enemies Close (Night 4)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, #33: Friends Close, Enemies Closer. Oooh boy... last arena chapter, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet, hot damn you guys pulled through with those reviews, because character have died and aren't coming back. Last chapter, it seems that Linden and Peri have come to an impasse where he does not know how to proceed, Valencia led the Careers to the slaughterhouse where Marcus betrayed the other six, and in the onslaught he killed Maisey and Hero, before dying in a brutal battle against Carrion, which I didn't realize I made so** ** _violent,_** **my god. Beyond that, this is the continuation of that day, this is now Night 4, and here we are, ten chapters since the bloodbath, final ten. Enjoy Chapter #33: Friends Close, Enemies Closer.**

* * *

 ** _Persephone Castor: District 2 Female P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

Numbness. The sound of silence, rather the sound of jolted static, that is what breaks in her ears and beyond that, _nothing._ She doesn't bother shielding her eyes from the light when she stumbles out of the Hall of Mystery, body shivering, limbs shuddering and twitching from having fallen asleep. Her shoes are slick with blood, and she might've taken them off at some point, but truth be told, she doesn't even know. It hadn't even been fifteen minutes inside that damned hall, the ringing of the three cannons still echoing inside her skull.

She wanders over a tree, pressing a clean hand up to her forehead to wipe away the dredges of sweat. Persephone is not the first person to have escaped the hall, but her district partner, Milor, who is sitting up against a tree, hands on his knees, knees brought to his chest, and he looks numbly ahead. _Shit._ Are- are they the only two alive? Are the others still trapped in that mirror maze of madness. The Career looks back at it fearfully, a weak cry rising from her throat. Every camera in the arena is probably trained at the Careers at this point, or to whatever remains of them now, if it _is_ just District Two and that there's eight tributes left alive, with Valencia, Carrion, Hero, and Maisey killed at Marcus's betrayal.

Persephone somehow is still holding onto her war hammer, the blood on the tip where she ended Corvus's life having dried hours ago, but now the coat of black is mixed in with the saltiness and bitter taste of crimson, and when she looks down at her own weapon, it is as if she had committed the massacre herself. She slipped once or twice, falling into a pool of someone's blood, but she does not stay behind to find out whose it is; it doesn't matter anymore, they're gone. Looking at Milor, a million thoughts cross her mind, but none of them could help her. Persephone cannot recall the last time she's ever seen Milor look so shaken, her district partner looking dead ahead at the entrance, sword not even in his hand.

It is her that gave the right away, she knows. That thought almost brings her to her knees, to face plant onto the concrete. They would've never advanced into that Hall of Mysteries had she not said it had been okay. It is Hero who convinces her that it is okay to take a step inside. It is Valencia who looks at her when they're standing in the center Persephone wants to puke, but if it is just her and Milor left out of them all, as the survivors, she needs to be strong; she cannot fight the others weak and crying. It is not Corvus's death that frightened her so much in the House of Horrors; it had been entirely seeing some doppelganger of hers, one she is in capable of proving to be real or rather a figment of her imagination, if she had just dreamt it all up in her head.

Death does not cause her to break down, at least not like this. Milor hasn't been the same, she senses, ever since he jabbed Marissa in the gut with his sword, and although he'll try and lie to her and smile and say he is alright, Persephone can see the lie written on his face that there is something inside of him that is not working the way it should be. Persephone purses her lips, going to say something, but instead she simply sits down next to Milor, placing a hand on his shoulder. Is there even anything to say? She has no idea, she has absolutely no idea. What would Hale want her to say? What would her mentor want her to do? She tries to search her soul and her mind for something that must've resonated over the years spent in her company, but there is nothing that is coming to mind, not a single thing.

"Are you okay?" she asks Milor.

He nods, not saying anything at first, the nod barely even the moving an inch of his head, as if it never even happened. She does not press him any further; if he wishes to speak, he'll speak when the time is right. Milor shifts somewhat, straightening his back. "I'm alright. Just... _processing_."

"Yeah," Persephone rasps. "Me too." She wants to find a way to put a positive spin on it all, but there is no light at the end of the tunnel that she sees right now. She honestly, and perhaps foolishly now, with brief hindsight, that the main six Careers, from Districts 1, 2, and 4, would've been the final six. Hero would've gotten lost somewhere on the road, she figures, but the six of them would be contesting for the crown. Now? Can any of them even _become_ victor?

Someone else stumbles out of the Hall of Mystery, Persephone immediately launching to her feet. Valencia Shale takes what looks like a drunken step into the sunlight, and Persephone has to hold into a gasp. Valencia is paler than pale, face and arms having gone as white as sheets. Blood cakes her arms and her face, her black hair a tornado of god knows what in the air, and she's sure there is blood mingled in that as well. Valencia has her arms stretched out, as if she is carrying a body. She walks as if she is levitating a bit on air, holding someone in her arms, but who that would be, Persephone cannot fathom at the top of her head.

The two girls lock eyes, and it is Valencia, the leader, that crumbles to her knees. "Valencia!" Persephone cries out, catching the girl in her arms as well as she can, almost getting brought down with her. She looks beyond worse for wear, and it is a look that the girl from Two never expected to see from the one who walks around with her shoulders pushed back.

"I led you all to death," Valencia is muttering over and over again, shaking her head, gasping for breath a few times.

"No you didn't..."

"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..." the girl will not stop saying those two phrases over and over again. Persephone looks over at Milor helplessly, furrowing her eyebrows together, making a frown. What is she supposed to do? What can she do? Is she now the rock that holds the alliance together? Is she the one to push for excellence and to demand they dust themselves off and stand back up again?

"Valencia, snap out of it. Snap out of it Valencia," Persephone grips the girl by the shoulders, shaking her. Valencia's eyes are glassy, as if she is the one who has been shot with an arrow. Persephone swallows heavily at the realization that she very well could be injured and this is their supposedly fearless leader drowning in a sea of fear, about to meet the great beyond.

The other Career has tears in her eyes now, crystalline waters spilling down her cheeks. "I've failed you all, I can't do this anymore, I-" she starts to babble.

Persephone is no longer having this. She does not like women, she never has, and she never will, but there's only one thing that'll work and gods be damned if Persephone wants to get back onto her feet. Maybe Valencia is the exception. Gripping her tightly by the shoulders, Persephone leans in to kiss her, to kiss Valencia. Their lips collide, and it is as if time slows down to an insect being trapped in amber. Valencia's body reeks of copper, of iodine and the smell of death, a Grim Reaper standing over her, the daring scythe swinging back and forth, to claim another victim. However, her lips are of a pocket of sunshine, pearl-like in color, smelling of rosary and clover, a slight beam of hope.

Valencia's babbling ceases to exist as she melds into the kiss, and when Persephone breaks apart, her heart is rapidly beating in her chest with the power of a thunderstorm. Her eyes are impossibly soft, staring at the lighter skinned girl as if her heart had been stolen away, even though there isn't anything romantic between them. Valencia looks stunned, as if she still wasn't covered in blood, swallowing heavily, a battle going on in her eyes, but that battle contains Persephone is unable to determine the contents of.

"I had to get you to stop going on and on..." Persephone apologizes, holding the other girl by the shoulders. "You're the one who has to be strong, especially if none of us can't. Please," and she holds Valencia's hand in hers. "You're going to have to stay with me."

It is reminiscent of last night, they sitting around the campfire. Persephone has no idea _why_ she kisses Valencia last night after waking her up. It is her - Valencia's - arms that she feels hugging her the tightest while she sobs into the cinders, about seeing her terrible other half in the Hall of Horrors, at how she is afraid of herself and what she could become. It is the leader that has held onto her with the strongest grip, even beating that of Milor's who she's known the entirety of her childhood, up until this very point in a death arena. It fascinates Persephone, a notion she is unable to put her finger on, and it perplexes her.

Not much perplexes her.

She will keep Valencia's faces, both of them between when she kissed her last night, and when she kissed her just now, in her head until she dies, forever. A softness that she does not normally see from their usually calm and collected leader, where the lips part ever so slightly, the eyes widen as if she's been hit with a rush of endorphins. She does not like her in that way, but something does compel Persephone to Valencia in that manner, a place of strength that comingles with beauty. Persephone has overheard what Valencia says to herself when she thinks no one is listening, how she isn't gorgeous enough to catch some suitor back home in District 1, and she wants to say out loud, to whichever camera or scumbag in District 1 who'd hear her, that Persephone Castor believes that Valencia Shale is _gorgeous,_ with every fiber of her being.

"Thank you..." Valencia whispers, lifting the hand closer to her face, squeezing, and keeping it there.

Persephone opens her mouth to say something again, but is caught off by Milor. "Carrion!" her district partner cries out in shock, and he runs past them towards his boyfriend, colliding with him into a hug.

Blood everywhere. Persephone gasps, holding a hand up to her mouth. The boy from District Four is drenched in, from head to toe, and it drips off of his spear tip, off of his fingers, off of a few follicles of hair that have gotten unwound and spiral out of control. Carrion tips over a bit, steadying himself on his spear. It can't be all of his blood... right? All four of them are alive, Persephone realizes then that Maisey and Hero are most definitely not coming out, and then that means...

"This can't be all of your blood... right?" she hears herself asking, as if Persephone is viewing her own body in the third person, above, watching it play out in a time loop.

"No, it isn't..." Carrion exhales shakily, dropping the spear.

"Carrion, you're injured," Milor places a hand gently to his boyfriend's side, and when he removes his palm from the shirt, it comes back putrid with scarlet.

"Just a scratch," the other Career grins, teeth stained copper, and a bit of blood pours out of his mouth. God... what _happened_ in there?

Valencia shakily gets to her feet, both of them looking as if they've come straight out of horror memories. "Hero and Maisey?"

The other boy shakes his head, eyes downcast to the ground. Persephone's heart drums in her chest, and Milor bows his head as well in respect for the dead. "And Marcus?" he asks, momentarily after that.

Carrion's voice is strong, a reverb unlike any other as he straights his back the best he can, setting his shoulders back. "I threw him onto a broken mirror and stabbed him through the throat with it," he extends a hand for Milor to grab, steadying himself on his boyfriend's support. "The bastard is dead."

"Good," Valencia says, and although Persephone expects it, the coldness does shock her slightly, ripping through her bones. It is a coldness that she's never experienced, even though winter does indeed hit hard in District 2. "Serves him right, for betraying us like that."

Milor's grip will not let his boyfriend fall, Persephone knows that her district partner is sure of it. "You need to lie down, Carrion; let me dress your wounds."

The spear trails behind the boy from District Four lazily, like a kid holding a stick in the sand to make pictures. "I'm fine," he growls. "I don't need to lie down. I'm just... really... thir... sty..." and at that moment in time, Carrion falls straight on his face, out of breath, and exhausted.

Oh for the love of...

As Carrion fell, Persephone's heartbeat quickened, as the moment his knees gave out to the concrete, there, on the air... all of the water in her mouth dried up at the resonating sound of a fourth cannon.

* * *

 ** _Colt Sheppard: District 12 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

He and Alexandra pause in their walk at the sound of three cannons, following each other resolutely through the wooded part of the arena, unbeknownst to them that the District 7 pair had been relatively close by. Colt pauses first, and although he does not have a weapon in steel form, he can still go fighting and swinging with his fists. Alexandra matches with him, extending her spear a bit out from them, as if to ward off potential demons in the dark. They both are carrying wooden weapons, taken from trees, sharpened to their pinnacle state, but he isn't really sure in their actual power.

"Three cannons?" he whispers.

"The Careers, maybe?" Alexandra frowns. He doesn't know why she's whispering, because there's hardly any of them left in the arena now. Even when there were twenty-four tributes in the arena, it still didn't matter, the spaces were too elongated where they could have gone days without meeting anyone. In fact, he and Alexandra _have_ gone days without seeing anyone else since the Bloodbath; it is just them losing allies that taper off and go and die.

He rolls over on his side, muttering something incoherent, when he sees Rochelle's face in the sky, her expression rather demure, normal and at peace, killed by someone or something as she wanders off to get supplies for their fire. Late last night, after he hears about Alexandra's tragic past, they come across a fruit stand, and there are written notes everywhere by the Gamemakers that the fruit presented on the stand is edible and safe to eat. They look at each other, starving since their last meal, and take up a plethora of apples, a plethora of bananas, oranges, a lemon or two, and a basket of strawberries. Alexandra goes to stuff the rest of the food into her bag, taking the entire stand with them, but there is no way all of that is going to fit inside the bag; that's just impossible.

"Leave some," Colt says, holding out a hand and grabbing her wrist.

Alexandra looks at him as if he has six heads, noticing that he's touched her, in which he immediately lets go, because the glare she musters has some firepower to it. "Why?" her tone is almost mocking, as if she is the true leader between the two of them. In actuality, Colt realizes, what has he done for the alliance? He gets a group of five on the outskirt females together to join him in some display of gallantry, only to witness one get beheaded, one get stabbed in the heart, one abandon the alliance and mysteriously die, and the other wander off for supplies and she never make it back. All he has done is lead people to their death, and when he is balked about it, he snarls and bares his teeth, hissing at any unwelcome intruders. He can't even hold onto his weapon at the end of the day, and Colt's heart feels like it has been stabbed over and over again.

"In case someone else is starving," he explains.

She shakes her head, frowning. "I thought the point of the Hunger Games, Colt, was to win. We very well can't win if we're letting others eat." Cold much? Colt is taken aback by just how resolute her voice is, how confident sounding Alexandra has become in being so dead set of having everyone murdered. Could either he or she actually bring the end to someone in the arena? He has no idea.

"Wouldn't you rather win defeating the strong than beating the weak?"

Alexandra wrinkles her nose. "I'd rather win defeating the weak, Colt. Less effort; makes it easier," However, despite her push back, she relents on taking anymore of the fruit, closing her knapsack and throwing it over her shoulder for later. "I want to win regardless, though." There's a sentence left unsaid, but it travels on the wind and resonates in his skull despite her not uttering it, _I want to win, which means I come home over your dead body._

When they find a new place to camp for the night, Colt watches as Alexandra falls asleep first, hugging her wooden spear to her chest, which pokes out a bit from the crook of her arm, and that must not be a comfortable way to sleep. She's honestly extremely pretty, he thinks to himself, forming a slight smile, arms crossed over his own chest, he sitting up against the base of a tree. If they were not trapped in some death arena, he would be asking her out, more likely than not. Something about her just draws Colt to her, to Alexandra. It very well may be her bright hair, a color not often found in District 12, in the Seam, when working in the mines day in and day out as the soot will turn the brightest roots a charcoal black. It turns to dust in your fingers, working the brittle strands, like the last bits of tweed rope coming undone when you walk across a shaky bridge that decorates a ravine.

It very well may be her attitude, that he is unable to place a finger on to what that attitude might be, but she seems to be willing to throw the punches. She's surprisingly strong, and that catches Colt off guard when she flips him over in the plaza, an elbow in his neck, her foot squarely placed over one of his feet which means he's unable to get up. He looks into her eyes, taken off guard by a serene ray of diamond shining into his own darker sheen, a gloss of mahogany, an acorn dropped into a clear ocean. It hits him then and there that she could easily kill him. He faces the challenge of being unable to kill, as when Colt looks down at his hands, he doesn't see those of a murderer. It may not necessarily be murder if he is given the freedom, the allowance, to do so, but that is now how he is raised.

His grandmother's hand pressed against his face is something he can still feel if he places his own hand to his cheek. " _Do what you can to survive, Colt, but do not kill. You can be violent, but I will not support a grandson who wins by stealing someone else's life._ "

That thought races through his head. How else is he supposed to get home if he _doesn't_ kill? Even if he were to, hypothetically speaking, inflict a wound in Alexandra's arms that maims her, unable to give chase, and she bleeds out from the wound, dying... he still _killed_ her. Won't his family see that? Colt bites on the inside of his cheek, listening to the chirp of the crickets and the hum of the fireflies, stuck between a rock and a hard place.

His family also told him to be chivalrous, to lead a good man's example. It is why Colt is polite in declining Valencia's request for him to join the Careers, where he would've stuck out like a sore thumb. This is before the thought to have an all-female alliance occurs to him, while getting dressed in his cashmere outfit for the Interviews. It would have been just him and Gaia facing the brutalities of the arena before them, to be her gentleman, like his family had said. It is upon him to help those that are weaker.

He looks over at Alexandra, who is starting to rumble into their shared bag for food. She isn't weaker than him, he knows that for sure. Alexandra Quinn does not need Colt Sheppard to ride in like a knight in shining armor, over a hill, armed with a lance, to fight the fearsome Capitol for her. Marissa certainly didn't need it, he thinks bitterly, as she manages to make off in the second morning with all of their supplies, as if their alliance hadn't meant a damned thing, because he is too weak to admit that he wouldn't be able to kill her, getting in her face and trying to act intimidating because he _isn't_ intimidating.

"You think it is the Careers, huh?" he asks, throwing back his shoulders.

"It has to be," Alexandra takes a bite out of one of the apples. "Who else has an alliance this large that three cannons can happen immediately after?"

"We did, at one point," Colt says bitterly.

She stops from taking another bite, finishing the one she has with a swallow. Alexandra turns to him, stopping Colt by grabbing his wrist. His eyes flash an unknown emotion, but he senses a bit of hypocrisy. Why is it okay for her to touch him on the wrist and not he to her? "You didn't do anything wrong for the others," she says. "I don't want to ever hear you say that you caused any of their deaths. Gaia and Marina we couldn't save. Marissa was a bitch. Neither one of us could have predicted Rochelle," Alexandra digs her nails into his wrist, causing a slight wince, as it is a bit of pain. "You understand me?"

"Yes, I understand," and he feels beyond disappointed himself that his voice comes out in a slight whine, a loud little peal, like a dog barking for the pain to stop. "I got it." She lets go of his wrist, taking another bite of her apple.

Colt falls behind her this time. Neither one of them know where they're going, just away. Constantly on the move, like what anyone else would want or agree to doing. Every tribute left in the arena has probably adopted that mindset, and at some point, there'll be a fight, there'll be a bloody fight and he'll stumble from his horse and die. He mulls over the tributes that are left, trying to account for the three deaths that he knows have just occurred, if their cannons are anything to go by.

He and Alexandra are crossed off immediately. He is pretty sure the body he is in _is_ his, and the decisions he is thinking are his as well. The fear he feels when looking at Alexandra, the slight twinge of his heart... that is purely natural, it is him and her together. There's that girl from District 5, but Colt is slightly upset at the fact he cannot remember her name. Colt recalls, sitting in the living room with his grandmother, always getting so upset at the Career victories or some of the cockier tributes that would always say how they cannot remember the names of the tributes they've beaten to sit in those plush chairs and be interviewed by Pollux Aetos. How could they not remember their names? Do they have any idea how insulting that is? Any semblance of thought given to that at all?

She is unfortunately, since he cannot remember her name, cannot place attributes to a face, so the girl from District 5 remains a potential mystery at this point. There is the District 7 alliance, Peri and Linden, and he knows that the little boy has strength to him, but _Peri..._ if she is still alive, he has no idea how at this point. Last he saw of her is the girl wandering off stage weakly, needing a stagehand to help her down the stairs, followed by Linden's valiant arrival, cheerfulness and all, as he drops the bomb that his district partner is suffering from cancer. Unless she does not have cancer and this has all been a masterful ploy on her part? Colt wouldn't know to be necessarily be upset if that had been the case, honestly.

The next alliance to tackle is the large assortment of Careers, some of which Colt is impressed by, others not quite. Valencia, he knows, is capable, given her training score. No one gets that training score and isn't a lethal fighter or at least isn't expertly trained. Her district partner, Marcus, has given him a slimy vibe, standing out slightly, but Colt thought he could've taken the guy in a fight eons ago. Carrion and Maisey were tributes that Colt did not know how to read, powerful in some regard, but got lower scores than the others by a margin that the Capitol would most definitely take notice of. Persephone is someone Colt watched, allured by her feminine charm, wanting to get to know over shared bowls of bread, but in the back of his mind, he knew that she had been the enemy. You do not fraternize with the enemy. That left Milor Drusus, and as far as Colt is aware, the Capitol's golden boy. Every single person seemed to love him, but Colt knew better than to be swayed by District 2 charm. There had to be something dark hiding behind the boy's eyes, to get to where he had been, muscular and fit. If Alexandra is right, and that those three cannons were Career deaths, which names would he be willing to cross off that list? Who would've succumbed to Death's whisper?

What name is he forgetting?

It hits him like a spur of lighting. Caiden Grove, of course. The very antithesis of who Alexandra is. He looks at his alliance member fearfully again, having remembered what she told him last night. Not above thievery. Not above stealing. Not above asking for forgiveness, but there is no way she actually feels any regret or remorse. They're in a televised arena to the death, cameras trailed on them everywhere. She'd simply say what she has to say to keep herself alive. That is the goal, right?

Colt pauses, noticing that Alexandra is no longer walking even with him. He turns his head, frowning. She is stood back a bit away from him, a far larger distance than he had anticipated, standing frozen. He doesn't even say her name, all because he is overwhelmed by the pure look of fear in her eyes. She has dropped the apple, and his eyes follow the trail of wetness from where it landed on the ground and rolled.

It is now an apple, with her several bites into the skin, that has turned charcoal black. The black like the kind trapped in the miners' hair, the black that sticks in between his teeth when he takes a breath. Why would the apple...? Colt's eyes widen. He is thinking of Caiden Grove, in relation to Alexandra... and their shared history.

 _Poisoned._

He reaches her the moment Alexandra's knees buckle underneath her, the girl giving a silent cry as she stumbles forward. Colt's hands firmly grip her waist so she does not hit her head on the concrete. Nothing seems awry, but that is until Colt has Alexandra in his arms, his silent hero, his strong hero, the girl he admires from a far with an iron pole, does he see the problem.

His hands are soaked in blood, as he watches, trying to hold in his vomit, as Alexandra spasms out in his grip. He's screaming her name, Colt is pretty sure, but at this point, all that might be coming out is raw noise, raw blackness in a void of pain. Her throat is dissolving before his very eyes, skin folding back in on itself and revealing the inside, spilling copper everywhere. He's poisoned her! How has he poisoned her?

"Stay with me, Alexandra," Colt begs. "Don't give in. You're stronger than it; fight it!" he pleads.

She tries saying something, it coming out like a brutal croak, and instead, a bursting of blood follows as the rest of Alexandra's throat gives way, the girl going slack in his arms, the very last words she ever said to him to be that he isn't the cause of everyone's death. He should've told her to put all the fruit back...

Colt barely hears the cannon that fires a few seconds later. Her body falls out of his grip, he having let go, and when he looks down at his hands, they're covered in blood, from his fingers, up to his elbow, and he does not want to think of the puddle he might be sitting in. He looks back at the apple core, it having disintegrated completely into the dirt...

There could only be one option to who had done this. He must be out there right now, knowing what's happened, watching right now with his seedy stare and cackling to his heart's content.

The boy from District 12 lowers his head over Alexandra's chest, her heart having gave out long ago now, and he is simply sitting down with her corpse.

He lifts his head and lets out a raw scream, a scream so harsh on his throat, no sound comes out.

* * *

 ** _Milor Drusus: District 2 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

"Careful..." Carrion hisses, jumping slightly away from Milor, who is currently dabbing a bit of ointment on one of the Career's wounds.

"You can't move."

"Well, it _hurts_!"

"It hurts because you're moving!" Milor raises his voice at his boyfriend a bit, feeling somewhat guilty for doing it. There shouldn't be any need for screaming, especially not if he wishes to wake up Valencia or Persephone, both girls passed out in the corner of their latest spot for camp, which had been the same exact spot under the diamond obelisk. Wandering through the Hall of Mystery had been a giant mistake, an absolute mistake. A waste of time, too, as the remaining four got nothing done except watch allies die, and listen to the stories of watching others die.

There's been four total cannons all day, three for the Careers, and fourth that is unknown. Milor has a slight panic attack when listening to the cannon, the moment that Carrion falls to his knees from exhaustion, unable to help the scream that rips from his mouth and into the open air. Persephone leaps with him as well to their ally, and when he flips Carrion onto his back, panicking that there may have been a fourth Career lost to the madness of betrayal, relief floods through his veins when he can feel the steady _drum-drum-drum_ of his boyfriend's heartbeat underneath his hand.

Valencia, still shaking, still covered in blood, but recovering, as are the others, valiantly decides to simply stay in the same spot for camp, as there'd be no reason to go anywhere else; it just wouldn't make sense to try and find another place to sleep for the night, not after everything else has been tried and true, known to work. She and Persephone collapse together, rather comically, in each others arms, endearingly as Milor looks on. Carrion is still passed out by the time they get back to the obelisk, carried in the District 2 male's arms, as he honestly isn't even that heavy. Carrion is beautiful when he's asleep, Milor realizes, sputtering brown hair out of his eyes, the gentle rising and falling of his chest... and he's all Milor's.

He keeps watch while the others sleep, worn out from the betrayal. Milor is exhausted, too, but a good soldier, a good _ally_ doesn't succumb to the wanting of sleep. He realizes, with a rather bitter thought, the same nastiness splashing the back of his throat with a sharp, acidic flavor, that they've all fallen asleep roughly around the same time the last three nights. None of them stay up to keep watch, which is downright stupid, plain and simple to think about in hindsight. If someone had been up to keep watch, it is all because they were unable to dream away the demons; the demons would pursue them to their fantasies in their heads. Marcus had planned to go it alone as it is, Milor recalls, from Valencia telling them before the Interviews, when they're conjoined in the circle, but she lets him back in because he saves her life and she feels that she owes him a debt. Perhaps it had been something Milor could have seen coming, and it is a partial thought, unformed, in the back of his head.

He never thought it would have manifested to something along these lines.

"Softer!" Carrion barks, as Milor is trying to massage the other Career's side, the boy digging his fingers into the flesh a bit too hard. Granted, he really just wants to feel up his boyfriend's side, the muscle taut and quite divine under his fingertips.

"Sorry," Milor quickly apologizes, slowing his pressings, smoothing out the rest of the ointment. He reaches over Carrion's lap, seeing slyly out of the corner of his eye the way the other Career bucks up a bit, just so his crotch is somewhat closer to him, but there isn't time for that right now, unfortunately, and he hates to have to be the one to give that away. Grabbing up the gauze, he takes out a decent sized patch of it, enough to cover a few of the cuts on his hands, to wrap around the stab wound that sliced open his palm, and the grisly cut Carrion receives when being slammed into a mirror. "This might sting a bit..." he advises, and Carrion grips onto Milor's wrist.

He buckles a few seconds in, after the Career presses the first half of the gauze square up against Carrion's side, and then the other boy hisses in pain as Milor then flattens down the square, having to run his hand over the cut. He then cuts off a few small strips for the undersides of Carrion's feet, as he had lost a shoe of his somewhere in the mess, running over jagged bits of glass, which has now cut up the skin from toes down to the ankle. Milor places his boyfriend's left leg on his knee, about to press down the next strip, when Carrion sits up abruptly.

"Don't!" he exclaims, rather suddenly, sitting up and drawing his legs back. At Milor's raised eyebrow, slightly surprised expression, Carrion swallows heavily. "I just don't like people touching my feet. Sorry."

Milor hands him the gauze, turning his back to Carrion, who brings his legs close to him to wrap his feet in the white bandages, lightly hissing as he does. Part of his body is the normal tribute clothing, which is a black jumper, and the rest is a mummified version of the boy from District Four. Milor places the rest of the medical supplies back in the main bag that Valencia holds for sake keeping; it usually does not leave her side. Originally, both he and Marcus contest her holding the bag, but then Milor remembers that their leader is a leader for a reason, a leader because she has the highest training score, she is the best bet for holding onto the medical kit, and he trusts her to not get rid of it.

He turns back around, having zipped up the pouch, and Carrion's finished taping up his foot, slight splotches of red appearing where he covered his feet. His toes, luckily, are okay, or he probably wouldn't be able to walk. His boyfriend has the thousand yard stare, lips parted, eyebrows furrowed, an expression of pensive thought on his face. Milor, for no reason at all, grabs his sword, balancing it on the concrete, resting his elbows on it.

"What's wrong, Carrion?"

The other Career blinks, shaking his head. "Nothing, I... I was just lost in thought-"

"You're lying," Milor interrupts him, setting the sword down, trailing it behind him, kneeling in front of Carrion. "Your face is like a book. You're easy to read. Something's bothering you." He _knows_ what it is, but just like how he kept all the shit that his father had done to him inside his soul for years, all that did was hurt him, he never got better, and Milor let those wounds fester, until he stood on stage with cameras in his face and Pollux's breath pouring down his neck, that does the load get lifted off of his shoulders and he no longer feels like he's carrying the weight of the world: the Panemian Atlas. Perhaps he should not have been so direct, however, Milor realizes, after speaking, because his tone is too sharp, his words too acidic.

Carrion sighs, struggling to get to his feet, but it doesn't look like he needs any help. His spear is lying over in the corner against one of the spokes of the tower, and he picks it up, looking down at the weapon. Some of Marcus's blood is still there, unable to be washed off, and Milor doesn't want to be the one to clean it either; there's still some blood from Marissa that is splattered on his sword, and it will remain there for quite some time.

"I've killed two people in this arena," he says, looking back at Milor. A pang runs through the boy from Two; he's never seen the look that his boyfriend is giving him. A cold stare, a cry of desperation, a terror that he's never, _ever,_ noticed. It's rather scary, a desolation hiding from the truth. Milor will admit, and he is pretty sure he gets that vibe from Persephone and Valencia as well, that none of them _enjoy_ killing, but it is the action that must be done if he wants to get out of the arena alive, and he likes living. Milor opens his mouth to rebuttal, but Carrion raises a hand. "That's not the problem. I'm a Career, and it's technically what we have to do," he shakes his head, swallowing heavily. "I snapped that little boy's neck, Deacon... the guy from Three. I threw Marcus onto a shard of glass and since he didn't offer mercy to Hero or Maisey when he killed them, I forced the shard of glass through his head so hard it poked out the other side..."

Milor lets out a light gasp after hearing that, wiping at the back of his mouth. That had definitely been something he had not wanted to picture, as even though he asked Carrion earlier how Marcus died, he didn't expect that detail. "God, that's... extreme-"

His boyfriend looks down at the spear. "I haven't killed either tribute with my weapon of choice. Just my bare hands," he looks up at Milor, and there are a few tears in his eyes, but tears that dare not spill down onto his face. "Something came over me both times when I ended their lives. Like... like a demon that grabbed me and I felt proud of what I did. That I enjoyed watching them die..." he shudders. "I don't like that feeling, but I can't seem to help it from happening."

He doesn't know what to say in respect to that, he honestly doesn't know. What Milor does know is that he is not being of any good damn use to his boyfriend if he is standing so far away from him in a moment and time of need. He marches over to Carrion, grabbing his hands and placing them to his face, lips inches apart. The temptation is there, to connect their lips together, but the romance would ruin the moment. "What do you see?" Milor asks.

That seems to fall on deaf ears; Carrion furrows his eyebrows, frowning. "I don't understand-"

Milor tightens the grip, squeezing the hands a bit further onto his cheeks. "Carrion, what do you see when you look at me?"

Carrion lifts his head slightly, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat. "Eighteen year-old Milor Drusus. My ally. My heart's desire..." Carrion can be strongly romantic when he isn't even trying.

The male from Two lowers his boyfriend's hands down to his throat, where the thumbs, if they were to dig into the soft, pale flesh, would be at his own Adam's apple, effectively choking him. There's a method to his madness. "Would you intentionally harm me?"

"Of course not," Carrion rasps. "Is that even a question, Milor? Are- are you being serious?"

"Would you harm me?" Milor asks again, and he tightens the grip of his hands, so there's a bit of pressure placed on the throat, where he can feel the thrumming of the flesh, the scorching heat.

"I wouldn't dare dream of doing such anything."

"Have you, in your fits of rage, ever thought of harming me?"

"No," Carrion shakes his head, and he kicks away the spear, just to look a little less threatening.

Milor lets Carrion's hands drop from his neck, missing the feeling of something warm and delightful pressing up against him, but there is tonight for that, he supposes, if he needs it. "All you have to do is think of me in those moments, then. They'll go away."

Carrion lets a tear fall down his cheek. "I'm afraid. Just like what Persephone said," he looks down for a second, unable to contain the eye contact. "I'm terrified of myself, when I'm in that state. Of what I could become."

"Then you'll just have to learn how to control it, Carrion. I won't be able to fix it by myself," Milor admits, and he kisses his boyfriend's hand across a few knuckles, sucking one in under the wetness of his tongue.

The boy from Four wrenches his hand back, holding it to his chest. Milor's heart breaks slightly, ever so slightly, but it might be a crack that he is incapable of noticing, having hid his true self for such a long time. "I'm terrified of ever hurting you, though," his eyes flash with the force of a thunderstorm. "Just because I haven't thought about it, doesn't mean it won't ever happen."

Milor takes a step closer, trying to not have the disappointment, and even slight fear that flickers across his face. "You're mine, and I'm yours," he says. "Right?"

"Right."

"Forever and always?"

"Forever and always," Carrion nods.

Milor smiles, dropping the defenses a bit, and then he leans in to kiss Carrion on the mouth, a kiss that contains the cinders of District 2, the chalk and the grained smell of the air, mixed with the saltiness of the sea, the mango scent in his hair, and the coppery blackness, bitter lavishing of blood. When they break apart, a second tear has joined its companion on Carrion's face. "Then there is absolutely nothing you need to fear. We're together, forever and always."

He is trying to convince Carrion, and he hopes he is doing a good enough job; they'll be alright, they'll be just fine.

Now if only Milor can convince himself of the same clearly evident truth.

* * *

 ** _Caiden Grove: District 11 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

Caiden lets out a loud whoop into the air, throwing his head back with a laugh as he stares at the anthem, and the face of his district partner, Alexandra Quinn, shines brightly in the sky. She's gone, and he couldn't be any happier. The one single person who has destroyed his family by stealing from them years ago, after getting so close to his heart, and now she's dead, she is not winning the Hunger Games, and she does not get to return to District 11 alive. The Quinn family will get to experience the pain and sadness that the Groves have been experiencing ever since that tragic day. Hundreds of dollars gone just like _that._ The snap of someone's fingers, and Caiden is unable to remember what else had happened except that there's a strange hole in the family safe, his pants are unbuckled and down at his waist, and his head is killing him.

He sees the other three pictures as well, the three dead Careers, and there's a brief moment of elation, but it does nothing to soothe his nerves. Caiden has seen how the other four fight; there's no way he can beat them all single handedly, unless they decide to go wandering towards his poisoned apple collection, if they are even around still. Who knows what the Gamemakers have done with them? While Victoria, Maisey, Hero, and Marcus were all Careers, all scoring on par or higher than him, and in tune with that comes a dose of lethality, Caiden believes them to be the weaker half. Valencia, District 2, and Carrion... their skills turn Caiden's blood to ice whenever he pictures having to get home over one of them.

Besides the four of them in the arena, is anyone else around an experienced killer? Say what you want about Caiden - he defends this truth - but he is not some adept swordsman or killer. Marina is an easy target, a whimpering thirteen year-old who he didn't have to kill as ruthlessly as he did, but her death needed to be quick, over... it is just that the opportunity presented itself so beautifully, with a nice little bow on top. If he had not killed her in the bloodbath, she would have fallen trap to some Career machination. He spares her a worse fate than what he delivers, at least that is what Caiden tells himself to help him believe he's right for straight up murdering people without a fair fight.

The boy is unable to stop smiling when the auburn fade of Alexandra fades into the rest of the arena's holographic blue dome. The last snapshot of her, as he'll never, if he makes it home to District 11, associate with anyone from that family again. Actually, as this just occurs to him, causing the piquing of his eyebrows as he leans lazily up against one of the shop's columns, that as a victor, he might be able to pull a few strings, just a few. The Quinn family can kiss their prosperity goodbye. They've taken so much happiness from him and his family, he might as well repay their gifts tenfold, in blood, flesh, liquid poison, and the closing jaws of a leviathan planning to snap around their throats.

Armed to the teeth, Caiden shifts a backpack over his shoulder; Marina's supplies were definitely delightful to take, and honestly, he wants to know how a thirteen year-old girl managed to grab a knife, a sleeping bag, and a few bags to take with her at the Cornucopia without one of the Careers catching her off-guard and lobbing her head off. It mystifies him, and everything else had been practically taken at that point, so it is lovely to have some sort of treasure for himself in his area. He still has the sword that he drives through the girl's back, piercing her heart, but when Marina dies, there hadn't been any utterance of noise; she dies painlessly, peacefully, and in the thaw of the other horrific arena sounds.

He places the sword back into his palm, testing the heaviness of it. Caiden swears it, and he's noticed it over a few days, that the arena seems to be a living and breathing conundrum. Not just in the way that the Gamemakers are controlling the arena externally, as that is always something noticed by everyone who watches the game, but that in the arena itself is _alive,_ changing and adapting to people. When he rips off a leaf or two from a tree to crumble in his hands, when he wakes up the next morning under the same tree, likewise as a forest fire gives rebirth to the meadow it scorches, the leaves are back in a stronger, full bloom than they were the night before. A living, breathing organism.

Is that even possible?

Caiden takes a step forward on the concrete, going to go check out a side of the arena that he thinks will be something wonderful to discover, having seen the diamond obelisk in the broad daylight but never making his way over to it. His feet are firm on the ground when there's a snap behind him, the sound of several twigs breaking, and something crashing to the ground inside the shop he's resting up against.

He freezes, trying to not make a sound. Is someone following him and they've just made their presence noticed? Caiden has seen, but he deduces it to be him simply waking up in the middle of his R.E.M sleep - which is an occurrence not to be interrupted, or otherwise it means the individual does not get a full night's rest - this glowing pair of yellow eyes that follow him on the tree line; it's been that way since he dropped the poison in the crate of apples accidentally, and he gets shivers up his arms thinking about it.

Then, faintly hearing it, in the shadows, is a _growl._

That is not a person. Not a person. Caiden's eyes widen, his throat seizing up, as sticking out in the shaw of the darkness, in the veil of black, is that pair of beady halcyon eyes, glaring, looking at him. There's no one else to look at, and it is dark outside, so they cannot be observing the starry night sky; the creature would be unable to see them at their distance.

In a flash, something snarls now, the growl getting louder, louder, _louder,_ and all the hair on his arms stands on end. Something jumps out of the shadows, Caiden falling down onto the ground in shock with a heavy scream.

Thinking fast, Caiden swipes out his sword, holding it with one hand on the hilt, barely just in time as a mouth clamps down on the blade, some large mass landing atop him. All he sees now, are the eyes, and then this creature's ravenous, razor sharp teeth. He's breathing heavily, unleashing terrified yell after terrified yell as this monster tries making throes at him. With every move the beast makes, snarling and trying to bite through the sword stuck in between its jaw, there's a horrific clanking associated with it, a metallic grinding and shearing, as if someone is moving two iron plates past one another.

The beast bites down on the sword, trying to reach Caiden's neck, but the tribute pushes harder. He did not just witness Alexandra's face shine in the sky to then be murdered by some ravenous mutt, as that means the Gamemakers have some dangerous sense of humor. Each bite it makes, something spills out of the mouth of this terrifying creature, Caiden's arms getting coated in it. The substance burns his arms, perhaps an oil of sorts, and Caiden tries to keep his scream down to a minimum.

With one reserve of strength, as Caiden is going to burn into pieces of flesh if he tries fighting off this monster, he pushes back with the sword, braying the monster up slightly, freeing his blade, which remarkably is undamaged. Screaming a battle cry, Caiden slashes left and right with the sword, bashing the creature in what he assumes is the head, as under the cover of night, he is unable to see anything except the eyes and those teeth.

More oil splatters onto the concrete pathing, the creature falling back, its growl rising into a whine, more than anything. Caiden scrambles to his feet, trying to run away, but he slips and falls, skidding his knee. He's wearing too much on him, on his back; he'll never be able to run with this much holding him down. Unbuckling the sleeping bag from his belt, he kicks it in the direction of the beast, before racing off from its direction.

The beast recovers from its hits, snarling, and running forward, but its jaw catches onto the sleeping bag first, stopping it in its tracks. He steals a look back as he runs, his heartbeat roaring now, as the monster rips the sleeping bag to shreds. Stuffing and leather flies everywhere, landing in the trees and hanging off of branches and building awnings like the massacre of a teddy bear collection. The eyes narrow, Caiden's body goes stiff, and the monster snarls again, running after him.

Caiden lets out another scream, trying to will himself to go faster. He runs through another shop as a shortcut, throwing one of the shelves down in an attempt to slow the creature down. It barrels through it, plastic tubing and boxes of tissues splitting into pieces of seven and soaring in the air, a confetti rain of paper and plastic. He is clenching onto the sword for dear life, and he is not stupid enough to drop the weapon, as if it that would make him run any faster.

He spins around a corner, and thinking fast, heads in the direction he had originally been running around. Perhaps the monster is stupid and only knows about running in one direction, right? Caiden runs in the direction of one of the roller coasters, it a lustrous and gleaming twisted blue track in the moonlight, curvaceous pieces of steel rising high above the causeway. His soul does not have time to absorb in the craftiness of their ancestors, with Hell's incarnate in pursuit.

The boy reaches the gate that closes off the entrance from the outside. Caiden's heart sinks down into his toes, staring at the padlock that looks like he'll be unable to get through. Looking back behind him, in the darkness of the tree line, are those halcyon eyes, but it looks like the mutt is searching for him again. Once a lion has their first taste of blood, they always come back for more, craving it until their want for thirst is quenched. Something about the Capitol, the boy has learned quick enough, is that those wants for flesh and the crimson river of life... it is an unquenchable thirst that will never be satisfied.

Caiden slashes hopelessly at the padlock, but it only makes a sharp dinging noise that, when he looks back at the eyes in the darkness, they seem to be getting closer and closer again. He slams his entire body weight into the gate, it buckling under him somewhat, but with a groan, a violent pushback of protest, there's nothing to it. The growl and snarls return back to his ears, and Caiden fearfully looks back. Big mistake. The mutt begins to run at him again. _Oh shit._

Though this might be the dumbest thing he's done since being in the arena, Caiden shoves his sword through one of the slits of the gate. He is unable to fit through it as one movement, as he's quite a big guy. For this moment in time, he is defenseless. Gripping one rung of the gate, Caiden hauls himself up. If he falls, he is dead, but he does not dare look back at the monster that is chasing him. He climbs another rung, when something drags him down. He yelps, daring to look down, but there isn't any pain stuck with his feet.

A strap on his backpack is caught on one of the spokes sticking out from the gate, unable to be tugged freely. The mutt is getting closer, he can hear its claws on the ground, the snarls getting closer, the howling getting more ferocious as the mutt gets closer and closer. Caiden grabs the side of the backpack that he can reach; inside it is his food, Marina's knife, and a few other important supplies, but none of them as important as his life. The bag falls down to the ground, freeing that last bit of weight holding him down. Caiden swings one leg over the other side, and the mutt is upon him, leaping up with a snarl; the climb is a good ten feet or so.

Caiden jumps down, the mutt's mouth extending a bit, and had he not dropped down when he did, he would be without a right hand. He rolls when he hits the ground, now a few feet back from the gate. He picks up his sword, his entire body trembling, he covered in a thin sheet of sweat, his forehead glistening. The mutt prowls in front of the gate, snarling at him, baring its teeth, but it seems to not want to ward beyond that point. It hisses at him once more, before running off into the night.

He presses a sweat-slicked hand up to his forehead, which does nothing for him. His bag on the other side of the gate is destroyed, beyond destroyed, food packets thrown into the air as the mutt tears into them, and he's lost his sleeping bag, but he's alive, Alexandra is dead, and everything is alright with the world.

The boy from Eleven brings a hand to his neck, clenching the glass heart. He is more relieved, with it all, that he did not lose his token. Had it shattered somewhere, Caiden doesn't know what he'd do.

Caiden looks around him, his nerves starting to settle down. He then passes his gaze back towards the direction in which he had run from, swallowing. Whatever that mutt had been, whatever it was... he's beaten it, for now. That side of the arena, the side he is still stuck in, it is not safe.

However, in his defense...

Is anything in the arena safe anymore?

* * *

 **10th: Alexandra Quinn, 17, District 11 Female. Killed by Caiden Grove of District 11. Created by SparrowBirdEliza. Well, this has been a first for me, I think; having a district partner kill their district partner. Yes, she took an apple from the spot Caiden set up, ate it, and since he accidentally poured the entire valve onto the set, unlike what he wanted to do, she couldn't handle the poison and it killed her. It looks like Colt's alliance has purely crumbled in his hands, and man, I had plans for Alexandra, but looking at the game board that I have set, with the plans I have that I want to put into motion, she was no longer in the scheme anymore, there wasn't a definite place I wanted to put her, as the other tributes left in the arena... their stories aren't over. Alexandra, thank you, thank you very much for existing, for facets I didn't know you had in you; you'll be terribly missed.**

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ] / **Persephone Castor** [ _Submitted by DefoNotAFanGirl_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by Santiago poncini20_ ]

District 5: **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon_ ] / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **That was Chapter #33: Friends Close, Enemies Closer, ladies and gents, the fourth night of this Hunger Games, and like I said, as things were going to really pick up speed, this was what I meant, as now these tributes are dropping like literal flies. We're down to nine tributes, nine, and I will be honest here, all nine of the tributes presented have an exceptionally good chance at becoming victor, they all have storylines that I want to use and employ, but amiss, only one can become the winner and I know you all wish it could be your tribute.**

 **Now it is just District 2 and 7 that have both tributes around, but, in 'late-game' predictions, I want to hear from you all, who do you think will be your top five tributes? Who do you think will make the top five, and if you dare to be so bold, perhaps our top two? I'm interested in hearing and reading what you all think. Beyond that, it looks like Marcus's trick has actually made the surviving four Careers _tougher,_ as they've seen something horrific; Colt is on the breaking point, and Caiden has met the other mutt in the arena. Remember what Bonnie said about the mutts (Chapter Four, and Chapter Twenty-Three, specifically), and then go back and read Edwin's last two chapters (Twenty-Seven, and Twenty-Nine), and draw some theories, if you will, as we'll see that mutt again, just as an FYI. **

**Beyond that, again, top nine, didn't expect to reach it so soon, but victor is long and far away from us. Next chapter, Chapter #34: So She Wept Tears of Glass, will be a continuation of our Capitol storyline, but ooh boy, will that be picking up speed as well. Day 5, or Chapter #35: Valor of the Weak, will be a return to the arena, and we'll be doing a flip-flop. The days of double day chapters are over, the Games are hitting their full stride, and if you think it has been a dramatic, heart-breaking story, then I've got news for you; there's so much more. I hope you all do review, as I really enjoy reading your comments, insights, critiques, and so much more, because without you, submitters, or anyone else, this story wouldn't be here. I love you all so much! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	34. Tears of Glass (Capitol Plot VIII)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, #34: So She Wept Tears of Glass. As I am typing this, at 5:57 PM, it is Sunday, April 14th, and that means tonight is the Season 8 premiere for Game of Thrones, at 9 PM my time, of which I am a huge fan. I want to have this entire chapter written and posted before 9 PM, as there is nothing better to pass the time as I await the hype, because I _cannot_ wait. Last chapter for the Capitol, which was #31, Lewlyn and Rennie have made some progressions into their broken relationship, meanwhile Pollux and Bonnie have come to terms with a plan: the Head Gamemaker must die. This step into the Capitol will bring back characters we haven't heard from in awhile, and I am excited to be writing them again. Please enjoy Chapter #34: So She Wept Tears of Glass.**

* * *

 ** _President of Panem Calhoun Rodney P.O.V_**

* * *

He has started to enjoy her company, and that has perhaps been the gravest sin he's committed since taking the heraldry of the presidency. It could've gone to any of Snow's lieges or children, but Calhoun stares at the Capitol populace, and at the camera filming him that broadcasted the feed to the districts, and with his shoulders set back, chin high in the air, and a smell of fresh blood tainting the wind, he ascends to the throne. Throughout the time, after spending time with Lewlyn Davis, his Head Gamemaker, he is, at first, repulsed by her mannerisms.

Reputation proceeds you, after all, is the saying, and the auburn haired Gamemaker had quite the reputation; she's the mastermind behind not only President Snow's death, but also the traitor, Plutarch Heavensbee, and Calhoun smiles into the lapels of his jacket as the previous Head Gamemaker, leader of the District 13 rebellion, is gunned down at Lewlyn's command, for her to then take that seat of power. He recalls signing some document flippantly years and years later, Rennie's name popping up a few times on the page, but there are more pressing matters to worry about. It is Lewlyn that hands him said page, grinning while she does it, but he assumes it is his colleague being up to her usual tricks. However, hours later, when Rennie's severed tongue is delivered to him in a box, wrapped up nice and neat in a crumbled up paper towel, Calhoun vomits his dinner all over the carpet. Attached to the box is a little card, written in her own fancy manuscript, describing how a traitor to the country has been dealt with, and his opinion of the maniac, twin toting Head Gamemaker plummets.

Now, as he thinks to himself, at his own desk, years later from this point on, he has come to appreciate Lewlyn's company for what it is, even enjoying it partially. He does not know what is happening to her, as Calhoun does not see the same woman who ended the insurgency in the Capitol, or the same one who cut out her own brother's tongue... Calhoun sees a changed woman, someone willing to see her own mistakes and try to make herself a better person. He clutches his pillow at night, dreaming of Bonnie, whenever she's not there by his side, praying to something above hidden in the clouds that Lewlyn is spared from whatever wrath that will follow, as there is much to be done in the Head Gamemaker. A path she has to yet discover.

Confidently, Calhoun can claim that he saved her, when he looks at her from across his desk.

She arrives within minutes after his email to her own computer, which is quite spectacular on her part, Calhoun deduces. Normally she's late, by a minute or two, if there's some sort of set time, but Lewlyn is there, dressed plainly, auburn hair down against her shoulders, emerald eyes seeking some sort of emotion across his face as she appraises him in the doorway.

He beckons her to sit. There are two empty glasses on the desk, and a bottle of bourbon sitting on a shelf behind him, as they're in his study, but Calhoun nor an Avox go over to pour any of it; that is not what this is for. The urge to drink is there, but Calhoun wants to have this conversation to be as sober as possible.

Calhoun wastes no time. After Lewlyn has gotten comfortable, sitting in her chair as well as she can - he notices that she no longer clenches the arm rests like she used to whenever she would be in his office, her body language is more relaxed, the creases in her forehead running away in time - he scoots his chair back somewhat, crossing one leg to rest on the other, and he folds his hands in his lap; there should not be a semblance of confrontational intentions anywhere in his presence, and that means himself as well.

"Do you ever get sad watching the Games?" he asks her, the second Lewlyn is comfortable.

She does not anticipate the question, Calhoun predicts, the way her eyebrows rise at the question, a small look of surprise covering her face, but there all the same. "What do you mean by that?"

"Well, Bonnie told me, when she presided with you over the training scores, that you were nice with the tributes, instead of..." he grasps for the right word. In actuality, he knows exactly what he wants to say, but she is seeming to move past that point and it would be beyond rude of him to call her out for what she is.

"My normal bitchy self," Lewlyn finishes in the gap, and Calhoun knows that his ancestors are screaming at him beyond the grave, since he bows his head to acknowledge her answer. "I understand, Calhoun," she shifts in her seat, but, again, the language is at ease. "I do. I cry. I yell at the wall when I am making the decisions. I-" she is unable to finish her sentence, simply throwing her hands in the air helplessly. "Emotion does get to me, yes."

"I am the same way," he says.

He is surprised that she isn't surprised at his statement. Lewlyn simply nods her head, an emotion in her eyes shimmering, but he is unable to note what that emotion is. Calhoun wants to close the door to his study, it being wide open and probably not the right setting for this conversation to take place. All he needs is one shaky servant, whose loyalties might not be to him, but elsewhere, to hear this and begin spreading their misinformation like the plague.

She grabs the empty glass closest to her, but Lewlyn does not get up to grab the bourbon. She simply clenches the glass in her hand, passing it between her fingers. Calhoun recalls a time when there were fingers on his body, fingers that spread open his spine and fire enveloped him, it caused his toes to curl and his hair to ignite into cinders, but that was a different time, an old time. "If you want me to chastise you for feeling emotions, Calhoun, you're telling the wrong person this," she says. Lewlyn lifts the glass to her lips, but instead she wipes her lipstick on it, clearing her skin from the pink layer she had coated them in. She leaves the glass there, on her mouth. "I told one kid, Corvus, that he needed to take pride in what he could do and not compare himself to others. I broke down when Peri walked in and couldn't even make her way over to the knife throwing station; she was so weak that I physically altered the station for her. Then her district partner told us that she had cancer, and I put two and two together," she purses her lips, now setting the glass down. The lipstick smudges remain, and Calhoun looks at it, his right eye twitching. All he needs is for Bonnie to walk in later and see the makeup for her mind to make a million and one possible scenarios. "However, at the Cornucopia, when she fought that Career with her strength, for a second I was consumed in anger," Lewlyn clenches the armrests. "I thought I was manipulated by her and thought about shooting her dead right then and there," the Head Gamemaker looks at Calhoun dead on, and a chill runs through him. Her eyes are glassy, and there are tears prickling at the ducts. "However, I knew someone must've done something, because none of these tributes are good actors or actresses. Her weakness is real."

Calhoun decides to grab the other glass as well, running his pointer finger around the rim, but he does not get the bourbon either. "I helped her," he admits. "I, with a few of the doctors here, injected her with a strength serum so it gave her a Career fighting chance," a bulge appears in his throat, a force he is unable to swallow. "Every other tribute, even the thirteen year-olds... none of them were terminally ill, and she had the odds stacked against her far higher than what was deserved. I wouldn't have been able to live with myself had she died without at least getting a chance." Lewlyn smirks, seemingly out of the blue, a faint smile dancing on her lips. "What?" Calhoun asks, perturbed.

"You told me, before training started, not to rig the Games, because you thought I'd do it," she recalls, and Calhoun remembers that conversation, on the presidential balcony just a few feet away, with her hair in his face, the wind blowing, her lips pressed to his temples, and Rennie's hands down around his waist, unlocking his belt, splitting him open, fingers digging into his spine, into his heart, into his brain. "And here you are, eating crow. Does it taste good?"

"Tastes like shit."

"That's the point."

Lewlyn scoots her chair back, making her way over to one of the bookcases lying on the back wall. He watches her go, watches her every step, like a lion stalking a doe, but Calhoun knows he isn't fooling anyone; he's hardly intimidating. He has a different form of respect that goes hand in hand with his power, in accordance with the populace. Calhoun drums his fingers on his desk. "I called you here because I wanted your advice," she turns around to face him, and there again, is a surprised expression. He has hardly ever bent to her will, to say he _needs_ her help, because Lewlyn's help has always meant problems he doesn't know how to face appropriately. "I watched all the interviews over yesterday, and listened to the training scores that Pollux presented... and I had a thought."

"It won't do good with you keeping it to yourself, will it?" Lewlyn prompts, crossing her arms over her chest, frowning.

"I want to end the Hunger Games."

She drops her glass, having picked it up with her to walk over to the bookshelf. Lewlyn nearly falls over herself, staying sturdy as she grips one of the oak edges, fingernails digging into the seams. "I beg your pardon?" Lewlyn chokes on her own words.

Calhoun pushes back his seat, going over to one of the windows in his study, his back to her. He begins biting on the skin on the underside of his thumb. This has been something he's debated over and over again in his head, entertaining it when he is standing on the balcony with her just a week ago, and it takes him saying it out loud to the second most powerful person in the Capitol for him to come to terms with the fact that he means it.

"Bonnie and I have been trying to get a child for ten years, Lewlyn. Bonnie's body would reject it, and in three or four months, we'd be burying them in the garden," a choked sob emits from his throat. Lewlyn knows now, of his wife's infertility, more ammo to use, perhaps. She is the first person outside of the Rodney couple to know of the others, denoted by saplings in the garden, with leaves marking their death, scratches in the soil to signify the date of departure. "And now, with her pregnant, _really_ pregnant and all the healthy signs starting to show... it means I am finally going to get a child of my own," he turns to look at Lewlyn, who is frozen in place, looking at the president likewise, her mouth partly open, face in open shock. "I have been so damn concerned about my legacy, as Bonnie calls it, that I never thought about something seriously important..." he rubs a hand over his face, pulling the skin on his chin down till it is taut. "There was a poll, recently, that went through all the districts, concerning having children. Every adult, nineteen to forty had to vote and send it in to the Justice Building, else the person's taxes would be doubled."

"What was the question on the poll?" Lewlyn asks, this being the first time she spoke since he began to monologue, her voice hoarse as if she had been shouting at the wall for hours.

"Do you want children?" It is a simple question, and often times there are multiple answers as to why someone would not want a child at that point in their life, and then, at times, that answer would change. "From every district, the answers were clear. More than 75% of all votes, from every district, said they would not have a child, regardless if they already did..." his voice breaks into a choked sob. "Seventy-five percent, Lewlyn," he looks at her, but she is unable to hold his gaze. "They had to fill a reason in for why that had been their answer," Calhoun barely breaks out a whisper. "They didn't want to have their children become reaped. Better to spare a life from the world at the meager chance they could die," the president looks down at his hands. "Here I am, with Bonnie, beyond ecstatic that I'll finally have a kid, and nearly every adult in all the districts are no longer happy with that fact because their kid could die." He swallows heavily. "How unjust of a society do I run if that is the case?"

She makes her way to him, grabbing his hands, a response he does not expect, as her hands are colder than he anticipates, Calhoun nearly wrenching away from her grip. Lewlyn makes him look at her, mouth curled down into a slight frown. "Have you spoken to Bonnie about this?"

He shakes his head in dissent. This cannot be brought up to her, not at all. She'd lose her mind over it. "No. Bonnie cries over what the mutts may do to the tributes in the arena, but I know she enjoys their deaths regardless," Calhoun twists his tongue inside his mouth. "She'd never agree to me doing it."

"You don't need her permission," Lewlyn urges on. "You're president, and she isn't."

Calhoun breaks his gaze somewhat away from her, blinking heavily, frowning downwards. She's absolutely right... Lewlyn is, and that's not often that she is. There are too many jumbled thoughts in his brain to try and keep track of, but for the sake of Panem, he must. There wouldn't be a single person in the districts unhappy with that decision... and those in the Capitol who would dissent, Calhoun can deal with forcefully.

However, as Lewlyn lets go of his wrists, she poses an important question. "What about the tributes left in the arena right now? The top nine?"

He locks his jaw, looking down at his dress shoes. "I think we have to let this Quell end. I think that'd be for the best, for what has been set in motion. We'll announce it before the reapings of the 101st Games. Does that work?"

Lewlyn nods. "I've done a lot of soul searching, Calhoun, with how I have treated Rennie and others since I've become Head Gamemaker," she shakes her head, curls of hair dancing along her back. "If I feel guilty about making my brother mute for the rest of his life, it is hypocritical of me to want to constantly cheer on the deaths of twenty-three innocent boys and girls. They didn't fight like the mothers and fathers have a hundred years ago. No one from the rebellion would be alive now, as it is..." Lewlyn straightens her back, shoulders set. "I agree with you, Calhoun. The Hunger Games need to end..."

Calhoun's heart flutters slightly, warmth spreading in his chest.

If Bonnie had anything to say about it... she might be the only one lamenting the Games' loss.

She can weep tears of glass for all he cares.

* * *

 ** _Hale Cornerstone: Victor of the 87th Hunger Games_**

* * *

She knows better than to trust the mentor of a dead tribute at this stage in the game, but Hale Cornerstone likes to imagine she is able to separate herself from the rest of the crowd. No one can separate themselves from a body unless their willing to go the extra mile, to do what the others wouldn't; to set an example, is how Arizona would put it. Sitting on the couch opposite of her on the District 2 floor, with the moon high in the sky, and the Capitol's night life revived, is Lance Viel. His tribute died today, betraying the others, but as Lance swears, that had not been a plan ever discussed; Marcus Pharadane works on his accord, killing two others and himself in the process.

Hale should've closed the door in his face, when he comes ambling up the stairs, red faced from the exercise - he's _beyond_ out of shape, if she can even call it that - but now, she's forced herself into a conversation with him. Lance is the one of the seven mentors that had been in the Career pack that Hale knows the least, but nothing like the death of children to help create bridges that may strengthen into castles that form friendships. Hale is lacking in that avenue, she realizes, because, being married to Arizona, being sister-in-law to Hector by extent, and having lunch with Kevia is about it in terms of familiarity. It stops there. This could work.

The victor has a lock of hair locked around her fingers, twirling it and feeling individual strands graze slightly over her fingertips. Had it been a different time, such as Spring, it'd be Arizona stroking her hair, playing with her toes and fingers, suckling slightly on the sweet spot above her collarbone, whispering sweet nothings into her ear while he sits atop her, she gracefully tracing crop circles into his chest. Under the ever watchful gaze of Calhoun and Bonnie, with their such rigid rules, Hale feels touch starved over the last three days. Hector talks to her on the morning of the second day, face stern, eyebrows furrowed together, and warns her of possible gossip. Possible gossip seems to exist whenever their names are involved; does the Capitol have anything else interesting to talk about instead of Arizona Merviere and Hale Cornerstone being together? Anything at all?

Lance leans forward, hands unable to do anything significant. She does not offer him anything to eat or drink, nor does she let an Avox run a glass of water over to him. She does not trust him. Truth be told, ever since they met, as Lance is eight years older than him, she's never trusted him. The way his hair is slicked back with oil and gel, where it looks like he took a jump into an oil refinery and popped back out, that is already enough to make him look like a rat. His own games experience is tragic and terrifying, and Hale has heard the stories of him running amok on the apartment floor below theirs, buck naked, screaming to get the blood off of him, but it does not mean she is willing to allow him in her inner circle that Arizona and Hector have taken control over. A shiver runs through her at the thought, of what Lance's night terrors must be like. Hale can only pray that her nightmares never reach a terrible height like that. She'd be unable to live with herself, if things got that bad.

"You look drunk," she comments, his cheeks a burning and bright scarlet, his greasy hair rather unkempt, with strands spiraling into the air like wisps of smoke, eyes wide and aglow, his hands fidgeting over and over again. Hale gets lost in the motion of his fingers, fingers that work and are able to create knots of impressive form... her mind wanders a bit, into the lustful territory. If his fingers are good at tying a knot... what else are his fingers good for? For a split second, Hale's face burns and turns the same color as his own.

"I promise you, I'm not," Lance points a finger at her, slurring his words enough to prove that he absolutely is.

"Your tribute goes on suicide mission, and dies painfully," Hale picks at her nails. "You're allowed to be a bit into the bottle of booze."

"I'm sorry that he did that."

"Not as sorry as he is," she points out, grimacing. She has to look away when Marcus slits Hero's throat down to the bone, as the poor boy from District 10 loses his marbles, believing Maisey to be his long lost love, Victoria - another moment where Hale has to look away as those hands grab and break the poor girl's neck from the shadows - and she is unable to hold it together during Carrion and Marcus's fight, in which the Career from District 1 ends up impaled on a bloody piece of glass through the head; she nearly vomits up her lunch for the day, watching that, but it seems that the District 4 victors decided to skip out on the fight after Marcus's first arrow finds Maisey's chest, ending her. It is the worst for Hale, looking over at Arizona, watching the specific tribute he mentored - she had heard a lot about Hero, for how sweet he is, or... _was,_ and the dedication he had to the people he cared for, ended in such a brutal way - as she is unable to give him the comfort she knows he needs. All because of the fact that the Capitol watches every movement, and that includes _her_ movements.

Lance nods his head, the bob of his throat following a swallow. It is uncomfortable, to keep on bringing up what his onw tribute had done, but Persephone is still alive at this point. She has to remain strong for her sake, a daughter, practically, at this point. "Listen," he says, scooting forward a bit on his comfortable seat on the couch. "I didn't come up here to talk about that; I have something much more important to discuss."

That gets her attention; Hale purses her lips, sitting upright at her own spot, untangling the wisp of hair currently wrapped around her finger. That is the one way she could go bald, if the stress of being a Hunger Games victor wasn't enough. "What is it?"

He looks around the room, as if someone is going to jump out of the shadows at them. "After you left your lunch with Kevia two days ago, Bonnie ended up sitting at your table with her," Hale frowns, about to interrupt. Why would that be a cause for concern? The victors of District 1 and 2 were extremely close with the presidential body. Hale knew deep down in her soul, although she didn't want to admit it, about how dangerous it had to be, playing with fire in such a terrible way and expecting everything to end up okay. It is part of the adrenaline rush that every Capitolite loves, it is infused in their blood; it is a part of them. "Kevia told me about it later, after the fact, but that doesn't matter..." he clears his throat. "I think Kevia is going to blackmail you..."

Hale raises an eyebrow. "Blackmail me? How?" She knows exactly _what_ the ammunition would be, but that has to be impossible. She and Arizona have covered all their bases very well, beyond well, and none of the victors are that upset at one another to be constantly trying to screw each other over. _However..._ she'll lightly put a censure on her own thinking, if Lance is to be correct.

"I went to say goodnight to her, and I found her writing something down. I wanted to know what it was and she got secretive," Lance rubs his chin. "She got up to go to the bathroom and I went back to check what it was. Some sort of essay, I think. However... I saw your name on it."

"Mine?" Hale frowns.

"Multiple times in the first few sentences. I would've read more, but she flushed and I didn't want to get caught."

"What if it is just a love letter?"

Lance doesn't even bat an eye. "Kevia's a whore, Hale. You know she likes only men."

"Why didn't you just take it if you were so concerned about it?"

"Kevia would automatically know if she went looking for it," he leans forward, hands on his knees. "Tomorrow, when we're all watching the arena, I want you to go back here, and go to our floor. I want you to find what she's writing, so you can use it against her."

"Why?" None of this is making any sense to her. None of it is, but if Lance wishes to be secretive about it, part of Hale feels like she has to indulge in this pettiness.

"Because I care about you."

 _Bull-fucking-shit, Lance Viel. You only care about yourself._

"How I am even going to get into your floor?" Hale asks. A chill runs through her, realizing right then that she is literally only sitting a floor above them. Her room lines up perfectly with Kevia's. She has her own desk in her room... and whatever it may be that she's writing, she's doing it underground, doing it right beneath her.

There's a jingle in the air, as Lance digs into his pocket, and his eyes glow a voracious blue.

A key.

Their room key.

 _Jackpot._

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #34: So She Wept Tears of Glass, and it is 8:44 PM and I finished it in time for the Game of Thrones Season 8 premiere, hell yeah! That aside... I think I have finally gone past a point of no return with two of the characters, them obviously being Lewlyn and Calhoun. With Lance and Kevia, the victor storyline will go one way - what is Kevia writing? Is she really going to betray our District 2 victor? - but focus has to be diverted back to the first one.**

 **There are a lot of pieces in motion with this one storyline. After all, it has ten characters in it, plus the victor, whomever that may be, and it will come to a conclusion after the Games themselves, of course. I have struggled with Presidents and Gamemakers before, in the fact that we had Coriolanus and Seneca, who truly enjoyed having the Games and kept them around because of tradition and whatnot, besides being morally gray people, after all. If one of the characters is a decent human being, the other isn't, as was the original case with Calhoun and Lewlyn. Calhoun wants to stop the Hunger Games, immediately after the 100th concludes. I'd say that is extremely fitting, to end it at the grand 1-0-0, and Lewlyn, with her new leaf, her change of heart... she agrees. I have had this in plan for a long time.**

 **The question is, what do you all think will happen? I have to say, I am extremely proud of the Capitol storyline, with what I have created, and beyond that, what is to come with it... and I cannot wait for the rest to follow suit. That was Chapter #34: So She Wept Tears of Glass. Chapter #35: Valor of the Weak, will involve the tributes, and then back to #36: Matters Best Left Alone, will be a Capitol chapter, and so on and so forth. I hope you all do review, as I am sure you didn't expect _that_ to come out of Calhoun's mouth. I hope you all have an amazing day! We are 10 minutes out from the new GoT episode, for the final season, and I have my tear bucket with me. Love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	35. Valor of the Weak (Day 5)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #35: Valor of the Weak. We're back to another arena chapter, which last time we left off with those, Persephone rallied the surviving Career troops and got them back on their feet, Alexandra died due to eating one of Caiden's poisoned apples, Milor and Carrion have met a crossroad in their relationship, and Caiden has run into a mutt in the arena that looks like it won't stop at anything to kill those near it and that's an element of the arena yet to come into play. We're down to the final nine, ladies and gentlemen, and if your tribute is still alive, I would really hope and love to get reviews from you soon on what you think, as I am honestly tossing up eight different names right now for victor. That is why I do have a lot of Capitol chapters to help intersperse these, as it gives me time to plan out the next leg of the journey. In any case, please enjoy Chapter #35: Valor of the Weak.**

* * *

 ** _Annabellina Circuit: District 5 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

The feeling has settled in her and Abe's bones long enough. She wants to kill someone today. She _has_ to kill someone today. It hits her like a lightning bolt in the hazy tendrils of slumber, bolts spiraling up her back that awaken her with a gasp. It is getting down to the wire, now, with only nine tributes left in the arena, and the taste of victory is faint on her lips, a slight morsel that she can barely touch, but she wants it, she craves it more than anything she's ever craved in her entire life. To watch as someone collapses to the ground, knees banged up, face marred with scars, as blood drips down their neck and trickles onto the sand.

Annabellina wants power above all, as Abe speaks to her in the shadows, in the blackness of her skull. As she sleeps, keeping her new sponsor gift close to her, the flamethrower surely not coming to her cheaply, the thoughts become manifestations of being, and these manifestations will turn into motives, motives into action. Abe sits on a throne of obsidian, tossing a blade into the air, baring his teeth at anyone who comes close, anyone who dares approach the throne as he makes it his resting place. There is no redemption for him, for _her,_ Annabellina realizes, sitting up against a column, watching rain pour out from the clouds.

She'll look down at her hands, frowning. The arena punishes those who stay true to themselves; she's seen it firsthand. It is the competitive nature of the Hunger Games that awakens Abe, although it might have been a moment in her life that is inevitable, and she had only delayed it as long as she could before destiny took over and lifted her up. These hands that Annabellina stares at, they're soaked in blood, of her one kill, but even then, that one kill taints the back of her mouth in bitter, sulfuric acid. The paleness of her flesh is impossible to see underneath all the red, the ledger she is unable to wipe clean. It taints her from the deepest part of her soul, the soul she is unable to redeem. How the mighty fall, right?

The smell of smoke still lingers somewhere in the back of her mind, where if she is dozing off for a second, a hint of it will seem to resurrect from the back of her memory, Annabellina startling herself awake in a panic, cold sweat dripping down her forehead. It'll take a few moments of Abe screaming out insults in the back of her mind to die down before she realizes that there is nothing burning around her, and she is okay. As okay as she can be, of course, with stepping inside a Hunger Games arena. It is ironic, Annabellina muses to herself, that the smell of smoke is such a hindrance to her already failing mental health, and the sponsor gift that will change the world is a flamethrower for her to use, which no matter what it touches, no matter what it will eventually incinerate, the smell of smoke will rise.

Her panic is weakness, however. Abe has to place his hands on her shoulders, to mentally come out of her mind, to tell her this. Weaknesses are for those who will eventually succumb to the cold winds of winter, those that will starve to the death in the streets as they are unable to kill the rat that scuttles back and forth from the sewage drain. Food is food, and those who are unwilling to take the next step to save their lives will perish, simple as that, easy as that. Weaknesses, should they be exposed underneath her armor, is a lack of strength, a lack of conviction on her part, and Annabellina wants to leave. She has to win for her survival, for her family's survival, even if her father would not want her back as a Circuit, his only daughter who has become something he is terrified of.

Annabellina has had a thought in the back of her head that has begun brewing for awhile, but her heart is too terrified to fully commit to the thought in case Abe would be listening. _Abe is always listening, he listens and sees all. Every thought that comes from her brain is only him now. He's killed the others._ With a possible victory starting to rise on the horizon, Annabellina is wasting no time. If she wins and becomes the victor of the 100th Quarter Quell, she could make enough money to try and receive some form of therapy, and the last tangible hold Abe will have on her is his dissipating screams as he melts into a peaceful oblivion. However, as Annabellina even dares to let these tangent wild horses that are thoughts begin to run free, there is Abe at the end of the causeway, by the gates, holding a knife in his hand, to kill any of these rational views of her future in their crib before they reach the light of day.

She is his, and he is hers, no matter what the laws of medicine and faith say.

Her heart continues to beat erratically, something she's noticed over the last few days of being stuck in the arena. It is only the fifth day, after all, so many gone in such a quick time, but whenever panic begins to instill in her veins, clotting her bloodstream, there drumming in Annabellina's chest turns erratic. Part of her wishes to freak out, to tear hair out of her head, but then it will awaken Abe, it will _anger_ Abe, and an enraged Abe is nothing no one live wants. It saddens her, though, as she's gotten older, that she is unable to control the impulses. She knows absolutely nothing about psychology, but Annabellina will color herself purple before believing that one of her personalities is able to straight up murder the rest.

When she awakes the morning of the Cornucopia, there is an intense pain in her head. She screams, she cries out, she demands and begs for help and mercy, yet nothing comes to save her. Edwin is long gone, having been woken up earlier than her to go into the arena, and due to her intense amount of pain she is in, the Capitol ferries her to the arena in a different manner than that of taking the Capitol jet. She wonders what the gossip must've been among the tributes, of those that were willing to talk and ask aloud. No one besides Edwin had caught onto her, and only Edwin even showed a semblance of concern.

" _And now he's dead..."_ she thinks dismally to herself.

"It's a shame we didn't kill him ourselves..." Abe hisses.

" _He was our district partner!"_ Annabellina protests.

"He was our enemy, Annabellina. Remember that. Every single person in this arena that isn't us is an enemy. Him. Valencia. Caiden. Sweet little Linden..." Abe growls to himself sitting down and looking at his namesake directly in the eyes. Stalwart in form, with two beady darkening brown eyes that bear into her soul. He has access to every minute thought that passes through her brain, able to uproot the good in her and corrupt it with a wave of his hand. "All enemies. They all need to die!"

"I can't!" she shakes her head, looking at her hands again, curling her fingers inward like talons that belong to a falcon. Fingers that are spiked inward, that dive down and rip open flesh, ruining lives, causing copper to spill everywhere. "I can't do it, Abe! Lowelle was enough!"

"Lowelle was just the beginning!" Abe exclaims, standing up to Annabellina, towering over her by a good two or so inches, eyes blazing with the fires of the homes he'll destroy, of the empires he'll bring to their knees, of the diplomats whose throats he'll slit open. "Unlock our potential! Unlock our potential!"

"I can't!" Annabellina protests again. "I won't!"

She does not get to utter any more protests, as her throat closes up, as if someone is extending their hand and choking her. Annabellina gags, her hands rising to her throat, tugging at an imaginary arm that is not there. The arm does not exist, but _it does exist,_ in some backwards cavern of her brain. Abe seems to rise to gargantuan size, he squeezing his fist about her throat.

"You won't?" he tilts his head, making a manic smile. "I don't believe this was ever a partnership between us. We aren't equals, Annabellina. I'm your better. You, _perfected,_ " he rasps.

Annabellina gasps as best as she can with imaginary hands squeezing the life out of her. She crumbles to her knees, her face starting to turn odd shades of purple at the cheeks and her forehead. One hand drops from her throat to grappling at Abe, who raises his foot, slamming it onto her arm. Annabellina cries out in pain, and then the force evaporates, as he's let go, and she's bent over on her hands and knees, coughing and choking on air, fingers curling into the sand.

Abe shakes his head, clucking his tongue in disappointment. "You disappoint me, Annabellina. I thought you were stronger than that..." he crouches down, bringing a hand to her face, cupping it. Annabellina shudders in his grasp, twitching inward, trying to look away. "Will you listen to me? Finally?"

She looks up at him, eyes wide, face pale, her throat throbbing and red, the imprint of imaginary fingers that drive inwardly. "I will..." she struggles to her feet, Abe letting her stand up. Annabellina's body is trembling, but there is no warmth emanating from her as she shakes, where her hands are unable to stay steady. She lifts her eyes up from the ground to look at Abe, jutting her chin outward. "What do you want me to do?"

He grins wickedly, closing his open hands into fists. " _Burn them all..._ "

Burning. _Burning._ Annabellina frowns. Burning is the smell of flesh rising on foul and bitter winds. Burning is when her hair falls out and ignites in her hands, follicles crumpling and dying in the soil. To burn them all is to be like when her father finds her body smoking, out in the middle of the field, hands still clenched around the metal wire that electrocuted her. To burn them all is to have pain course through her veins like an elixir of life, a drug one is incapable of running away from, as she is incapable of running away indeed.

Annabellina looks back at her makeshift camp, her sponsor gift lying unused practically begging for her to pick it up and use it. She bows her head, closing her eyes. Abe is right, Abe is _always_ right; Lowelle back at the Cornucopia is just the beginning. She marches over to her flamethrower, picking it up, and throwing it over her shoulder, putting it on like a backpack.

Holding the nozzle out in her hand, a finger lightly resting on the trigger, Annabellina walks away from her camp.

Burn them all, Abe whispers.

Burn them all, Annabellina screams.

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

Has she failed?

Valencia isn't quite sure. It is a battleground inside her head.

She sits by herself when the anthem plays, from last night. Milor and Carrion are cuddling together, and Persephone also sits by her lonesome, with a thousand-yard stare gazing at into the trees, her hammer by her side dutifully, while Valencia forgets where she had even put her sword down in the first place. It is the good sword, the sword that she spots hanging off of the weather vane on the side of the building over by the Cornucopia. Reaching the sword makes it her first and only kill, as she can recall quite plainly - it is four days ago, now - as Galiant falls with a scream, before he is silenced forever, the spoke sticking through his sternum, coated in blood.

That is the first time she witnesses someone die in front of her. She does not see Galiant's last moments, but they're haunting enough. Watching beheadings and stabbings through the gut are terrifying as is through a digital screen in the Academy, but she is training whilst those gory events are happening, and she's usually never really paid all that much attention to it as she is so busy in ensuring the dummy in front of her is destroyed. She gives herself some credit, Valencia does, for not breaking into screaming hysterics the moment Blake's blood splatters across her face when Marcus's arrow finds the back of his neck. Valencia does flinch, she cannot lie about that, and neither can the cameras which watch their every move, but she is stalwart as his liquid life literally flows down her hair, getting stuck in the blonde locks. She isn't shaking when his corpse falls over onto the ground, followed by the resonating boom of the cannon, or when Marcus has her by the shoulders, asking if she's okay.

 _Marcus._

 _Marcus Pharadane._

With a name like that, Valencia should've seen the betrayal coming from a mile away, but she doesn't, as she is stupid and too trusting and too forgiving. She extends the olive branch to him again even though he had already broken it in the first place from his own volition; Valencia is foolish enough to believe that he'd never betray them, since he is even given a window of opportunity to rejoin the Careers. She finds it rather funny now, giving way to a stunted laugh - Valencia is glad no one is around her to hear it, otherwise they'd give her the boot then and now - that his betrayal happens on the fourth day, the day the grace period is to end regardless, had Marcus not been with them. It makes her suspicious, thinking about it further, when no one seems to give her any pushback about allowing Marcus back in the alliance - Maisey and Carrion scowl and frown the most, usually having kept their distance, but Milor, Persephone, and Hero let their qualms, had there been any to show, go unnoticed - and now her mind has gone through a wormhole she'll need to crawl out of.

She led Maisey and Hero to their deaths, and she didn't even realize it. Valencia puts her head in her hands, fingers digging at her scalp, combing through the lemonade strands. How could she be so blind? How could someone as intelligent as she claims to be, act so _stupid?_ Valencia knows that if she lets herself think about it for too long, her head will start to hurt, she'll start to doubt herself, and she cannot do that.

However, she does know this. She's failed. She's failed, not only as a leader, the role she has aspired to be since she could pick up a knife, but as a Career, what she has trained to be since forever, as long as she could remember, sitting down in front of her TV screen with her family, eyes wide and bugged out of her head as tributes slaughtered one another. Valencia is still quite not sure if she is into the whole shtick of the Hunger Games because of the bloodlust and the killing, or the personal fame and glory? Volunteering herself into the academy, it is a question that she still does not have an answer to.

A good leader is able to bridge the teamwork amongst a group of disheveled people; no one will lie and say that the Careers were not disheveled, unruly, and more. Valencia does that, on account, but a good leader does not lead their group like sheep to the slaughter. She should have smelled the bullshit pouring out of Marcus's mouth the moment he began to step forward by himself towards an unknown darkness - he has never proven himself to be brave, and it is undecided in her head if him saving her life at the Cornucopia warrants an instance of bravery, since he very well could have let Blake kill her and be done with it - and have tailed everyone out of there, but the forty seconds of delay she puts in, arguing with Carrion, Milor, and Maisey about her district partner has ended even worse than what she could have imagined.

How sweet, _sweet_ Marcus Pharadane could do something so cruel, so heartless... so _lifeless._ She remembers the beyond angry look on Carrion's face, how twisted in petulant rage are his features when he describes the way Hero meets his end, as someone unable to be given the proper moment and time to grieve. The way her stomach churns and nearly upheaves at the details of his demise will sit in the back of her skull for as long as she lives. However long that may be, truth be told.

Valencia is sitting a bit away from the rest of the group, Milor, Carrion, and Persephone all taking turns throwing knives into a tree, this massive oak in a corner, surrounded by a plethora of buildings, each impact of the blade into the bark sending emerald leaves to the concrete, in which the veins shimmer in the sunlight. Persephone dings the knife off the left edge of the target, sending the knife spiraling away into a shop. Carrion pushes past her, nearly sending her to the ground, which causes Milor to uproar into laughter. Persephone drops her hammer, taking after Carrion, and Valencia jumps to her feet. If there had not been a blade involved, this could be harmless fun. After Marcus, she can't be so sure.

Milor claps his hands together excitedly, turning around to face their leader. That is what she is... _right?_ Valencia has no idea if people have demoted her in silence and someone else has become leader via principle. "You want to join us?" he asks.

She smiles as well as she can, but instead it is the bulging of her cheeks, a ball building in her throat. Valencia wants to warrant herself the time to pour out grief to the people of Panem, if they'll allow it. She should be planning their next move, but brooding has seemed more attractive to her. "I'm okay," she lies. "It looks like you guys are enjoying yourself, though."

The Career from Two drops the smile, frowning. He crosses his arms, walking over to her. "Valencia, I hope you know that you're a terrible liar."

"I-" she starts.

"You're not," Milor insists, raising a hand. "It is written all over your face. You were by yourself all last night, and now you won't even hang around us today."

Valencia shuts her mouth closed, biting down on her tongue. The lucid taste of copper fills the basin of her mouth, coating her teeth in a ruby shine that will transform into an gilded piece of amber when a ray of sunshine directly falls onto her face. "I'm just... I can't get what happened yesterday out of my head. Hero. Maisey. Marcus..." she rubs her arms, shivering. "I should've seen it, or known that Marcus would've-" The way Milor gets her to shut up is to slap her across the face. One second, Valencia is babbling to an ally, the next she is sprawled out on the concrete, her face throbbing in pain. A rather vicious looking red welt appears on her cheek, her knees hurting from scuffing up against the ground. "What the hell was that for?" she shouts at him.

He looks as if he swallowed a rat and is staring death in the face. Milor swallows heavily, lifting his head slightly. "I'm sorry for doing that. I- I just needed you to shit up. To stop talking." He crouches down next to her, placing a hand against her cheek. His hand is warm, compared to the rather frigid feel of her skin, and Valencia cowers into the touch. She has to remind herself, for a second, that he's with Carrion, and she is not his to claim, as she'd kiss him here and now if she could. She's lonely, absolutely lonely, with an entire arena, and an entire nation possibly as her comfort. "Maisey and Hero are gone. Marcus is dead. You can't save them, now that they're gone. You can sit here and be upset about their deaths all you want, Valencia, but it isn't going to change the fact that you're here and they're not. We still have enemies in the arena, Valencia, and we want you to lead us. We wouldn't have let you be our leader for this long if we thought you were doing a terrible job."

How he has the ability to give the alliance a million dollar pep talk, Valencia has no idea. She is very happy that there are not tears running down her face, or otherwise this conversation might be entirely different. Milor extends his hand, she grabbing it, he hoisting her up. She brushes off her legs. "I deserve to punch you in the jaw for doing that to me," she says. "You could've at least mentioned you would hit me if I continued talking."

Milor laughs, but there's a slight fear in his eyes, one she notices because she is looking at him for a reaction. Had she glimpsed elsewhere, Valencia would have missed it. "You're right. I should have told you first. I'm sorry, I-"

"Don't apologize," it is her time to put a hand up, silencing him. "It's my fault that I let myself get like this..." she shakes her head. Valencia knows that lying to Milor's face, the only tribute left in the arena she possibly fears at this point, with Persephone being in a strange headspace, and Carrion injured - why is he running after knives if he is injured? - that it leaves Milor, the only person to score a ten, underneath her... the fear in his eyes is tell-tale. She is burning the bridge that links the two of them together.

He crosses his arms. "You know, there's something that's been on my mind that I've been meaning to ask-"

"What is it?" she interrupts him.

Milor purses his lips, narrowing his eyes. Valencia has a million thoughts racing through her head. _What is your favorite color? Do you like strawberries or blueberries better? What are you allergic to so I can poison your dinner in the middle of the night? How high do you think you'd have to be that if someone pushed you, your skull would shatter on impact?_ He could ask her anything.

He stutters out another nervous laugh, shaking his head, and then giving her a wide smile. "It's nothing."

Valencia raises an eyebrow. "Milor, I hardly doubt-"

"It's nothing," he repeats again, his tone a bit more serious than before.

At that moment in time, before Valencia could question him again, as he grips her wrist rather alarmedly - had she been holding her sword in her hand, this might be a totally different outcome altogether - is the moment Carrion and Persephone return from scrambling after the knife that had bounced off of the tree and flown away. At Carrion's expression of happiness, since he is the one holding the hilt of the blade, triumphant in his hands, Milor lets go of Valencia's wrist, his slight frown turning right side up back into the largest smile she's ever seen. When Milor goes back to his boyfriend, allowing Valencia a quick gaze at the Career from Four, she notices there's a gait in his step now, a slight stumbling, his leg wrapped up pretty heavy.

She sucks in her cheeks, walking over to her corner, and picks up her sword. Valencia needs a breather. Milor and Carrion get wrapped back up in their conversation, which, at this point, Persephone has grabbed the knife out of his hands, back to throwing it at the tree. Their expressions and energies seem to be positive, and Valencia is too wrapped up in her own head to try and dampen their happiness.

It is now going to bother her to no end at what question Milor wished to ask her. It could be anything, and for him to grab her like that so she could drop the subject... a chill laces through her body. Valencia places her sword back in its sheath, a wooden construction made out of tree bark, but it is good enough so she is no longer just lugging the steel around with her.

Getting about a hundred feet away from them or so, Valencia is brooding in her own spot of shade, all to herself. From her vantage point, she is looking directly across the Hall of Mysteries, where someone could enter from, from the place on the map that is marked in well, _mystery,_ given the building's apt location. She looks atop the lake, the one that Carrion dared not swim across to reach the other side, which would have been an hour and a half walk to the other side without swimming. It is a place of open space, so she can see any tribute coming her way and be able to prepare.

Valencia frowns, digging into her pocket, pulling out the map that she had, the same map that led Maisey and Hero to their doom, the same map and secret that unhinges the few bolts in Marcus's head that keeps his thoughts together. She looks at the unmarked spot, the gray border with the strange markings. The Gamemakers would not have included that on the map if they did not want someone to go looking for whatever lies in the beyond, in the unknown.

Right there and then, with that decision, she's made her plan. Whenever the Careers do split, should that be all four are alive at the Top Four, with there being nine left, or whenever they do disband and she's still alive - Valencia knows that she can go any moment, she is simply trying to not dwell on those factors - that is where she will go. If she is stupid enough and lazy enough to do it, she'll go through the Hall of Mysteries for her shortcut, maybe even find a way to climb over the building instead of going through it, versus taking the long constitution around the lake.

She stuffs the map back into her pocket, and as she does this, the ground gives a grand shake.

Valencia collapses onto her hands and knees with a weak cry, scared out of her wits. What the hell is it? She looks around wildly, trying to look for the source of noise, for the source of the shaking, but nothing is appearing to her. As the shaking continues, the trembles seem to get quieter and quieter, occasionally feeling them if she presses her hand against the concrete. She recoils away from it slightly, as it seems to be that, just like in the Hall of Mysteries yesterday when she bumped into the mirror before Marcus rained hellfire down from above, that the concrete, like the mirror, seems to mesh with her hand, as she pushes it in. Like... like quicksand, Valencia compares, but unlike quicksand, she can remove her hand.

The Career looks up, her heart beginning to beat faster in her chest. She squints, looking far into the distance, across the lake. The doctors back home in District 1 have always told her that she has perfect vision; it should come in handy every once in awhile. What- what is that? To her, it looks like a stone archway, raised up a bit, with a staircase seeming to extend down into the depths of something unknown. Valencia pulls the map back out of her pocket, at the stone archway, at the map, and back to the archway with the staircase.

That stone archway, if her idea of pictures being drawn to scale, is exactly where the Gamemakers denoted the 'X' marking on the paper.

Has she found the secret of the arena?

The ground rumbles again, lightly, but enough where she can feel it at the forceps of her fingers, and the stone archway, with its hill, and the staircase down to the black abyss vanishes back beneath the ground.

Valencia shakily gets to her feet, making her way back to the others. It is Persephone's turn now to be sitting out while Milor and Carrion squabble over whose turn it is to throw the knife. The dark-skinned girl looks over at her, giving her smile, and an intense flush of heat spirals through Valencia's gut. She doesn't know why, but Persephone just has that sort of smile...

There must be some sort of troubled, or rather mystified look on Valencia's face, as Persephone frowns. "Something wrong, Valencia?" she asks.

The blonde bites on the inside of her cheek. "Did you hear that rumbling just a second ago?"

"Rumbling? What rumbling?" Persephone stands up. "Do you need to lie down? Are you sure it isn't in your head?"

Valencia shakes her head adamantly. "I'm fine. I swore I heard the ground shake..." she balls her tongue up one side of her mouth. "Must be nothing."

That answer seems to satisfy Persephone, so Valencia leaves the girl to her machinations. She looks back at the lake, from where the stones seemed to rise from, afar and across the aquamarine surface, over by the Hall of Mysteries.

Has she uncovered the deepest secret of the arena?

This changes things.

* * *

 ** _Linden Hazel: District 7 Male P.O.V (14)_**

* * *

His axe head buries into the center of the wooden dummy's own skull easily enough. Peri whistles by him, she sitting down on the grass, while Linden walks back to the dummy, wrenching the axe free. It has been a quiet day for them, sitting atop the hill that overlooks a good portion of the arena, and as far as he is concerned, they're away from everyone else. They all count Peri out, Linden is pretty sure, and he by himself is too small a threat to do any satisfying damage; he'll agree with that assessment.

"Nice shot," Peri comments, plucking a strand of grass out of the ground.

"Thanks," Linden smiles briefly, tossing the axe in the air and catching it by the hilt. "Nearly took out my arm throwing it."

"Want me to throw one?" she asks.

"If you want. I want to a couple more."

"We gotta be ready, now that we're down to the Top Nine," Peri says. "The Careers may not expect us to be threats, but they're Careers," she scratches at her face, a light smile dancing on her lips. "We're up against a mad woman, a Career pack of four, and two vigilantes that I can't read. It should be easy, right?" The question may sound harmless, but her tone is threatened, slightly rising in terms of being labeled as panic.

"You should stand side-face," she says, rummaging through one of the backpacks they brought with them. Most of their supplies were actually left back in the building where Rochelle had come across them, but he does not want to go back there unless he has to, as he plays the sound of Peri's axe hitting the girl from District 3's head over and over again when he's trying to sleep; the sound just won't go away no matter how hard he prays, no matter how hard he begs.

"Why?"

"It shows your butt off more," Peri smirks cheekily, pulling out a fresh bag of strawberries that had been given to them yesterday via some sponsor, biting on one. He does not know who sent them, or if it had even been their mentor that gave them the fruit, as all that the card showed is he and Peri's name on the label, and inside, a bowl of strawberries lightly dusted in what looked like sugar.

A flush of heat creeps onto Linden's neck, and he breaks another, looking down on the ground. He had always found her pretty, Peri that is, even when she is entirely bald and looking like she could go at any moment, but now, with the strength serum, her hair is starting to return to her; long, luscious locks of lemonade is what Peri describes her hair as, and it sprouts out in strange patches, but some of it is starting to thicken and form a hairstyle that looks realistic. It adds a level of beauty to her, that is what Linden says. Occasionally she'll throw in some statement about his butt, or his muscles - Linden has form at fourteen, which most don't have, but Corvus did at fifteen, and the male Careers were all well-defined - but when he looks at her, blushing, Peri has her sight elsewhere, as if it is the wind that had just complimented him.

There is absolutely nothing he can do about it, though. They're district partners, they aren't pulling a 74th Hunger Games out of their asses, and only one can live. He does not have time for childish fantasy thoughts. He may be young, he may be pubescent, but he is in an arena that causes everyone who escapes them to become ever the wiser and get smarter, to grow the hell up... romance has no place for him right now.

Not after the whore.

Peri rolls onto her stomach, setting her knuckles underneath her head. Linden makes another toss of the axe, chucking it directly instead of twisting his body. The axe slices through the wooden dummy's torso at a forty-five degree angle, and the top half of the dummy plops into the grass. He goes and picks up his weapon again, placing it at his belt.

"What was she like?" Peri asks, biting into another strawberry, the fresh juices sliding down her chin, so reminiscent of spilled blood. He tries not to notice, balking his tongue in his mouth, frowning at his question.

"What was who like?" he runs a finger gently across the top of his blade, and he's surprised that he doesn't cut himself on the edge at the end, where it has always been the sharpest.

"Your mother."

Linden freezes, as he slides his finger over the axe blade again, this time catching his soft flesh. He curses, lifting his pointer finger up to his mouth, sucking on the slightest hint of blood that appears from the cut. It is bitter, it is sour, it is everything that Peri's strawberries are not. He looks back at her, Peri's disposition rather relaxed, still picking from the bag of strawberries.

He sits down on the hill, running his hand through the grass, strands tickling his palm as he ghosts over them. "Why do you ask?"

Peri shrugs, sitting up as well, handing him the sponsor gift. She sucks the remaining juice off of her finger, and he watches as pale digit after pale digit disappear behind the curtain of her rosy lips, and a pressure seems to build in his chest. "I've always been curious. You and I have talked a lot, but we've never seemed to talk about our parents..." she softens the tone a bit, running a hand through the tiny bit of hair that she has. "If you do, of course. You told me that she's..." Peri grasps for the word. Actually, Linden knows that she _knows_ the word, but just doesn't want to say it.

"I told you she's dead..." he rolls his shoulder. "Yeah, my mother's gone."

"How'd she... y'know..." Peri is really asking the tough questions today, he thinks smarmily to himself.

He shakes his head, throwing his hands up in the air lightly. It has always been a mystery to him, about what she's asking. "How'd she die? I don't know..." Her face can be pictured in his head if Linden closes his eyes, but the picture is fuzzy, the quality almost muggy as if someone is breathing hot air onto the camera lens. "One day, my mother is perfectly fine and the next the orphanage services are at my house, telling me she's gone and that they need me," he stutters into an awkward laugh, "And we know how that went."

Peri scoots closer to him, grabbing his hand. She rubs her thumb over the bridge between his knuckle on his pointer finger and thumb of his right hand, the motion oddly soothing to Linden. "I'm sorry, I really am," she takes a deep breath. "What was her name?"

Linden doesn't want to share that information out to her, as it doesn't just mean that Peri Florence, his district partner, gets to hear it; all of Panem does, and he doesn't want to give them that leverage over him should the chance ever arise. "I don't remember," and that partially might be the truth. "I think it began with a C..." another shake of his head. "I really can't remember my own mother's name."

His district partner makes a cooing noise in her throat, and Linden finds it ironic that she is giving him pity when that is the one singular emotion she has asked for no one to give her lest they lose a limb, but she readily hands it out to everyone. "Was she amazing?"

He takes a deep breath, a bit of the pressure on his shoulders evaporating. "She was the best mother I think anyone could possibly have, especially after Dad left," Linden runs a hand through his hair. If he cannot remember his mother's name on a lie, he cannot remember his father's name if he were telling the truth, there are only blurs where his face would be. "She loved me... and I loved her," a lump forms in his throat. "When I lost her, the vultures came and ate away at me." He removes his hand from Peri's consoling touch.

She shifts, wanting to get closer, but the look on his face is incendiary, a danger for all those who walk near it. "What do you mean?" she frowns.

He has had this story go through his head a million and one times. He thinks about it during the tribute parade, it hits him during Interview Night when Pollux has a microphone practically shoved down his throat, and the other woman's face comes to him yesterday when he and Peri are eating breakfast. If he does not entertain the notion or memory of the encounter, it should eventually go away... right? Linden is finding out now, as the arena is forcing him to grow up, that the thought will not go away. He can still feel the way the woman throws her head back in lust, hands that are dug underneath his back having fingers turn into a falcon's talons that dig into his shoulder blades and drag downwards.

Linden sniffles, wiping at his nose. The tears have not even started to roll down his cheeks, but without mustering much effort, it might not take too long for them to get there. "One night, a few years ago, back in District 7, I'm outside sleeping in the rain. It was over by the Justice Building, actually," he has to will himself to not close his eyes or otherwise all the sounds will come back to him. The way the rain splatters on the tin roofs, a constant _dink-dink-dink,_ or the way the air is heavy with moisture, and the smell of water clogs his nostrils. How it is combated with the loud booms of thunder, the rosy fragrance on the prostitute's legs, and the atmosphere around her that is light and friendly. "I could see someone standing underneath a building, looking at me, but I didn't want to get up. A couple lightning strikes illuminated the square, and there was this woman standing over there underneath the building, and she wouldn't take her eyes off of me..." a shiver laces through his body.

"How old was she?"

"No older than twenty," Linden tries to recall the best he can, but it is all fragrances and poison in his head now. He clenches his jaw. "She came over to me, introduced herself, and within two minutes after that, I'm lying on my back, too tired to do anything, and she unzips my pants."

Peri places a hand on Linden's wrist, a look of alarm rapidly spreading across her face. "You don't need to continue. I think I get the picture..." the sudden switch in disposition is odd to Linden, but in the midst of his storytelling, the reasoning behind it goes unnoticed.

"This prostitute had her way with me," he says, his voice riddled with disgust. "After she was done, and I was spent, she simply got off me, pulled her underwear back on, blew me a kiss, and left. I didn't even get to pay her for her service, and that's what guilts me the most about it..." Linden shakes his head. His mother leaving to somewhere, a place where he cannot go... she left him to be picked apart by the vultures.

His district partner tightens her grip on his wrist. "You have nothing to be guilty over, Linden. It wasn't your fault, and you didn't do anything wrong. She did, not you."

"I know that!" Linden snaps rather suddenly, he twisting his head to look at her. Peri jumps back a bit, the anger quick to leap higher than before, as his eyebrows are furrowed together, his teeth out. "I know it isn't my fault. It's in the past now, and I can't change it."

"The past..." Peri says at a drawl, scooting back. "It's in the past."

"In the past," Linden grumbles, getting back to his feet, unclipping the axe from his belt.

Standing side-face like Peri suggests earlier, he chucks the blade at the dummy, having resumed his normal programming. Discussing prostitutes taking his virginity in the rain with Peri Florence, and all of Panem is only a sign of his weakness, how his valor is sacrificed by puny tears and melancholic statements.

It is in the past, Linden realizes, and the past can't hurt him.

* * *

 _ **Persephone Castor: District 2 Female P.O.V (18)**_

* * *

It is too dangerous to light a fire. Persephone laughs to herself, actually, that when the Career pack had been seven strong, there's nothing stopping them from rubbing two sticks together and watching the embers take flight, but now that there is only nine tributes left and that has them all spooked. Instead of sitting around a campfire, discussing personal fears - the wound is too soon, and she winces at the thought being so easy to think; Hero, Maisey, and Marcus have their blood freshly spilled and she makes jests - the four of them - her, Valencia, Milor, and Carrion - are lying on their backs, on their sleeping bags, looking up at the stars.

She would have never expected it to be so peaceful. Looking up at the night sky, her breath is taken away by just how beautiful it all is, a world of wonder and awe just out there for someone to snatch up. It makes her slightly bitter, actually, that her namesake, the Greek tale she comes from, that woman rules the Underworld, a place of misery and dreary emotions, full of death, with fire and a three-headed dog... while here, on Earth, she looks at the interstellar kingdom and wants it all.

Milor and Carrion are lying next to each other so that their heads are touching, and Carrion is pointing out constellations that he can see to the other Career.

"How do you know about constellations?" Milor asks, flipping over onto his side, quirking an eyebrow.

"When you get as drunk as I've been before, you end up doing stupid shit," Carrion says. "Studying stars was one of them."

"And you remembered stuff?"

"I'm smarter than I look," Carrion winks.

"Oh, I don't know about that," Persephone jumps on the train, as quick as she can. He looks over at her, rolling her eyes. It is late, probably around one or two in the morning, parking themselves right by the Hall of Mystery. They moved from the obelisk, jumping between both spots, as they're only a couple hour walks back to the other side at the pace they go, constantly scanning the arena.

None of them have gotten a kill since Milor stabs Marissa in the gut with his sword, and Careers killing other Careers doesn't really count in her book. She knows that she is willingly skipping over the thought of stabbing Corvus to death in the House of Horrors, but the less Persephone thinks about that day, the better. Some skin shifts over her, and the thought goes away.

Persephone turns her head to Valencia, the girl looking elsewhere in the night sky, moreso at the tree line, eyes constantly scanning the horizon in case some sort of devil springs from the crevices of the tree branches. Valencia's hand is gently laid over Persephone's, and in a moment of instantaneous thought, Persephone curls her fingers upwards, to link with Valencia's. Their leader stills in her movement, looking at the girl from Two, and she smiles.

She is able to sense it, the look on Valencia's face, the troubled look, the one preoccupied with ninety-nine million thoughts that all lead to nowhere. Persephone can sense the loneliness, as it wafts off of the Career's body like a pheromone, like a flower attracting a bee to pollinate it, but instead she senses sadness, a distant feel to the emotion, like a candle which has its flame constantly flickering due to a wind that is unable to completely extinguish it.

Persephone may not be able to give Valencia the type of comfort she might need, but she can most definitely fill in the role of being her best friend, as every girl needs a best friend. When she looks at Milor, at her current best friend, there's a warmth in her soul, a kindred sort of kindness. All she is doing is waiting; she's known Milor for years, and he keeps the skeletons in his closet to be well-dusted, but skeletons exist all the same. It took her a few years to learn what it meant, as one day, when they're both fourteen, on a warm and sunny Sunday morning, Milor greets her in the Academy's common room normally. That means a wave, a bright smile, and a look of pure happiness on his face. Monday morning, he nearly breaks a kid's arm, punches one kid in the nose which _does_ break it, and curses at Persephone in the dining hall so badly that she doesn't speak to him for three weeks.

A family pet of his dies, and Persephone knows then and there what the problem is.

Milor Drusus, her best friend, does not know how to deal with loss. It angers him, it motivates him, but it angers him, perhaps to a point of inconsolable levels. If he acts so upset - which he is way in the right to do, Persephone is not discrediting him - at the loss of a pet, what would it do to him, at an older age where anger finds new forms to thrive in, the potential loss of his best friend, or his lover?

She tries not to think too hard about it, but the thought appears regardless, and now she can't clear her head of it.

Neither Valencia or Carrion know of this secret, and since they're getting down to the wire, Persephone knows there have to be some decisions that are just impossible to make, but she'll have to make them regardless. Here she is, best friends with Milor, and will have to go home over his dead body. She might not be as close to Carrion, but earlier, when they race after the knife that goes flying into a shop, they're both laughing, and she is enjoying herself, mind completely removed from the situation, and watching him fall will not be easy, with Milor close on his heels.

And Valencia… poor, _sweet Valencia._ What will she do? How will she die? Persephone bites on her tongue, to keep the imagery not as visceral, to remove herself a bit from the thinking process. How can she be so willing, so heartless? The girl is comforting her, trying to keep her on her feet after the travesty from yesterday, to kissing her and making her eyes light up, to maybe end up smashing the blunt end of her war hammer against her chest, shattering her rib cage, watching as the blonde heroine falls. Yet she will turn around in the blink of an eye and end her life.

The stars are no longer as appealing to Persephone. Looking at them gives her a void of blackness now, where the only replacement is that of her thoughts. Of those dark tangents, that breathe like they've crawled out of the House of Horrors, riding Corvus's fresh corpse, his wounds leaking ichor, leaking the golden blood of gods.

Persephone squeezes her grip on Valencia's hand so the other Career would look at her. "What is the beautiful Valencia Shale thinking about now?" she asks, over the voice of Carrion and Milor's playful bickering, discussing whether the former is actually stupid or not.

Even in the darkness, Valencia's eyes shimmer, and Persephone can see a hint of red appearing on her cheeks. Easy to play, perhaps. "About what my nightmares will be like," the girl answers honestly.

A spear of ice lances through her heart. Valencia is never able to lie, it seems, always telling the truth point blank, at how it is. Persephone raises a finger. "How your _dreams_ will go, you mean," and she smiles softly, resisting the urge to flick their leader's nose.

Valencia gives a soft smile. "If you want to think that, sure."

Persephone moves a lock of Valencia's hair out of her face, blown over by the wind, and the tinge of pink on the Career's cheeks brighten even more. "Try and get some sleep. I promise you that they'll be filled with unicorns and rainbows."

"I hate unicorns and rainbows," the other girl responds without hesitation, as blunt as she can.

The girl from Two laughs louder than she wants to, actually cackling and bringing a hand to her mouth. As she does this, there's a resounding rustle in the bushes, which is much louder than her laugh. Milor and Carrion's talking immediately ceases, and Persephone's laugh gets blocked in her throat. She rolls over to her other side, furrowing her eyebrows together. Valencia sits up, hands grabbing at her sides, cursing. She doesn't have her sword by her side, as it is too large to have with her holding it. Milor and Carrion seem to be in the same situation, their weapons elsewhere and out of reach.

The closest weapon is Persephone's war hammer. She looks back at the others, and Valencia nods. She gets to her feet, grabbing the end of the hammer, hoisting it back up in her hands. It simply could be an animal. It simply could be the wind. However, as the ice that goes through her heart from Valencia's response is much more than that, as she knows deep down that no animal in the arena would be awake at this hour, and the wind isn't blowing hard enough to rustle a herd of trees and bushes as loud as they did.

It can only be one thing.

A tribute.

Valencia, Carrion, and Milor are all standing behind Persephone - Milor has always said that he isn't the best fighter at night, his eyesight has been failing him in that regard for a long time - now armed with their weapons, Valencia and Milor with their swords, Carrion holding onto his spear, having to steady himself on his boyfriend's shoulder.

"Is there anything out there?" the boy from Four whispers.

Persephone takes another step towards the trees, where she had heard the rustle. It is a sea of emerald green, perhaps mixed with the black of night. Nothing. She sees absolutely nothing.

"I can't see anything," Persephone shakes her head. "I-"

She never gets the chance to finish her sentence. One second, she feels absolutely fine, the next, her entire body is screaming in pain. Barely over a loud rushing noise in her ears, she can hear Valencia scream, the boys scream too, but hers is the loudest. _"RUN!"_ is the cry of the Career from One. Over that, there's a male's voice, but Persephone cannot really hear it all that well.

"Burn!" the voice screams. "BURN THEM ALL!"

 _Annabellina._

Persephone takes a moment to then realize that she's _on fire,_ engulfed completely in flames. Annabellina steps out of the tree line, one hand on the trigger, the other attached to the nozzle piece of her flamethrower. Another wave of torrential hellfire comes streaming out of the silver tube, and Persephone's body catches alight again. Her neurons are gone, she feels, yet her body is searing hot, all she can see is white on the edges of her vision, as the flamethrower and the tribute holding it roar together in unison.

Her body collapses underneath her eventually, whatever might be left of it, but there is no pain any more. There's simply nothing.

" _I'm burning,_ " her thoughts tell her. She cannot stop thinking of how, like the namesake she belongs to, how _her_ Persephone dies via burning alive, whilst in hell, helmed by Hades, with Annabellina standing above her. How the last thing she hears is Valencia scream her ever-loving mind off, how her allies all abandon her in her time of need, and how her killer is going to roam free.

The edges of her vision are a burnt white, before the entirety of it all goes pitch black.

* * *

 **9th: Persephone Castor, 18, District 2 Female. Killed by Annabellina Circuit of District 5. Created by DefoNotAFanGirl. Well, I must say here and now, how much I loved writing Persephone Castor of District 2. Her character was one I think I was always going to like and enjoy writing, but I didn't expect to find _this_ much growth in her, as you all liked her character as well. The chapter with her going into the House of Horrors had not been planned, in the metaphorical sense of the Greek character Persephone going down into the depths of hell, eating of the forbidden fruit, and having to kill to come out of it. With Annabellina's flamethrower, an instance of Chekov's gun, someone was going to die to it eventually, I just don't think you all expected _her_ to be the victim. I will sorely miss you, Persephone; may Milor and Valencia redeem you.**

* * *

 _ **Tribute List (Boy - Girl)**_

District 1: **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by Santiago poncini20_ ]

District 5: **Annabellina Circuit** [ _Submitted by goldie031_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon_ ] / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #35: Valor of the Weak, and I cannot believe it took me nearly an entire month to write that, but I digress. I simply couldn't get past Annabellina's point of view, but the moment I did, everything else came easily to me. So, we've lost yet again another tribute on Day 5, down to our Top 8 (how many of those here did you actually expect to be here?) and we must say goodbye to Persephone, someone who I felt had huge victor potential, but I've cut that thread short. Annabellina has a flamethrower, Valencia has noticed something odd about the arena, and Linden has revealed some heavy emotional baggage.**

 **Several things to mention, and I'll do them in order. I am going to write Chapters 36, 37, and 38 to completion before I decide to post 36, to help ease the tension of having to wait long periods of time before an update. Chapters 36 and 38 are Capitol storyline specific, while 37 will be Day 6 of the arena, with our Top 8. I will be definitely having them all written by the end of the month, and will try to get all three posted by then, so if there is a bit of radio silence don't fret.**

 **Secondly, as I feel it is important to get out of the way, the Top Five will be another one where the tribute that gets 5th shall die via another tribute vote-off, since that was indeed what the Quarter Quell twist had been. So, since I clearly do not know who I am having in my top five until we get there, if you are a submitter with a tribute alive, cast your votes in up until that chapter, and we'll work from there. That vote off will be at Chapter 41, so somehow we're going to go from 8 tributes at the end here, to 5 by the 41st chapter, things will be picking up.**

 **Beyond that, I hope you all do review, as your feedback will be upmost appreciated. I have really enjoyed writing these tribute chapters as of late, and where I am planning on heading, we're gonna even get crazier in terms of development and drama and death, oh yes, the death. Thank you all so much for reading, and for your patience. When I get around to posting, Chapter #36: Matters Best Left Alone, we'll be off to the races. Have a great day! Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	36. Matters Left Alone (Capitol Plot IX)

**Hey guys, Paradigm of Writing here again with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #36: Matters Best Left Alone. This will be a continuation of the Capitol OC storyline from #34, set during Day 5 of the last arena chapter, which was #35. This is a three scene chapter for the Capitol storyline, and we're gonna be getting places, ladies and gents. I am so happy to finally be on summer vacation till August 25th, and it is in my prerogative to have Sheep Led to Slaughter done before then, and maybe even done before August, and nothing like the present to get that done. Enjoy Chapter #36: Matters Best Left Alone.**

* * *

 ** _Hector Merviere: Victor of the 77th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

"And to what do I owe the honor?" Hector asks, smiling as nicely as he can, accepting the glass that President Calhoun hands him. The glass is cold to the touch, on his fingers, pads lightly chilling up at the sensuous feel. Calhoun matches the smile slightly lower than that, rather a simple lifting of the lips, going to his seat in front of him. Hector rubs his cheek, having freshly shaved, loving the feel of stubble run over his fingers; he hates how quick his beard returns, but alas, the troubles of manhood. He survives an arena full of bloodthirsty tributes killing for other people's amusement and his arch nemesis in life is stubble. Is he failing to see the irony in this?

"I didn't know it was an honor," Calhoun clears his throat, straightening his tie. The president is dressed rather handsomely in a dark suit, fitting on his nature, Hector supposes, but he pays more attention to the tie, in the delightful, almost Roman-esque red and yellow, alternating bands that represent the Panemian colors, and it brings out Calhoun's strength, whatever strength that there may be.

It is starting to become late in the day, the sun starting to set over the Capitol skyline, where the amaranthines dance in the clouds, on the roads of bright halcyon and sunburst orange, as the clouds become a tight knit tide of black and navy blue, and where the nightlife noises get louder and louder; Hector can feel the buzzing of the Capitol populace on his earlobes, a tingling that encircles the entire air and makes his head vibrate.

"It's not very often the president requests a singular private audience, either," Hector points out. "Did our guys' night bother you, a few days ago?"

"Not that," Calhoun shakes his head, pulling a bottle of whiskey off of the table and uncorking it. The sound of a bottle being opened has always been pleasing to Hector, oddly enough, and he is unsure if he can even blame his old habit of alcoholism for that. The satisfying sound of glass sliding over glass, with that _pop,_ the release of air... it might be what sends the chills down his exposed arms. The president pours himself a bit of the amber liquid, but Hector keeps his close to his hands, passing it back and forth with the light pushing of his fingers. Another yanking at the tie. Hector tilts his head to the side somewhat, pursing his lips, but he doesn't say anything. He's known Calhoun long enough to know this; he pulls at his tie more than once in quick succession, it means he's nervous. "Actually, I thought you would've declined my invitation."

"Why's that?" the victor furrows his eyebrows.

Calhoun pauses, his eyes fliting up to the man from District 10, whose face is a bright and sunburned red, with his tanned skin, and awash in a face of guilt, long hard winters, scorched summers, and the blood of his enemies that drips off in driblets off of long curly locks of his hair. Calhoun corks the bottle of whiskey back, settling it down lightly, the tray it rests on rattling with the movement. "I thought you would've gone home after Victoria was voted off, given you were her mentor and all," he wipes at his nose, and Hector notices the way the president's hand seems to shake. Calhoun never shakes. "And with Hero dying yesterday to Marcus's betrayal, I assumed you and Arizona had no reason to be here."

Hector palms the arms of the chair. "Arizona wishes to stay for Hale and Kevia, given that their tributes are alive."

"And you?"

"I'm still here because I have to make sure my brother doesn't do anything stupid..." he gives another light smile.

Calhoun's eyes twinkle dangerously, and he picks up the glass, the whiskey sloshing inside the clear prison. "Such as?"

"All sorts of things," Hector does not elaborate.

He is not about to play snitch on his brother to the most powerful man in the country. Hector Merviere is many things: victor, brother, celebrity, killer... but a fool is not among his many traits, and betrayal is not one of his many talents, he knows that for certain. It becomes dangerous, he realizes, for people, who overestimate their intelligence, and for those that fall in the dragon fire of his mistakes, the people that pay for them. How many innocent people died due to the failed rebellion of District 13? How many innocent men, women, and children died to Snow's iron hand that crushed the rebels? How many innocent children have died in the Hunger Games due to the mistakes of their father, of their forefathers, and the forefathers before them back in the Dark Days?

Hector shakes his head. Thinking of these things in front of the president of Panem might not be the smartest move, but he'll be entirely honest, he's never thought of himself as _that_ smart.

"Are you doing alright?" Calhoun asks. "With them being gone? I got the feeling you were closer to her and him this year than some of the tributes beforehand."

It is a harmless question - well, perhaps not entirely harmless, as Hector winces inwardly when the words pass over his ears - but it has him gripping the edges of the chair, it creaking under his weight, and he closes his eyes, twisting his tongue inside his mouth, feeling the appendage slide over his teeth, like a snake, a slick snake. When he hears their names spoken out to the dust particles, perhaps their last companions, with their bleached out bodies, pale skin, sagging cheeks, teeth that'll rot out with years of lacking care, their dark hair to turn into weeds... a gasp gets caught in his throat as a choke. Hector clamors at his own throat for a second, Calhoun's eyebrows rising in alarm, and he - Hector - reaches over the desk, grabbing the whiskey.

Fuck the glass.

Use the bottle.

Hector puts the bottle to his lips, drowning in the amber liquid, it splashing down his throat and burning the pipe as it passes through. Calhoun, if he has any reaction, does not seem to make it more than middle level concern. The victor keeps on chugging and chugging, not caring if he goes through the entire bottle. Hero and Victoria were both fifteen, with futures way ahead of them in life, as possible victors, perhaps had they been eighteen, or District 10 officials, and maybe even Capitol officials if their paths were set straight, but when Hector views them, alongside his brother, there are stars in his eyes, literal stars, supernovas that explode and dance, and force dreams and beauty, and it's what he wants... and what he's wanted has led to their deaths.

The last drop of whiskey disappears down his throat, past his lips, and with a sobbing gasp, Hector sets the empty bottle on the desk, all while Calhoun has his eyebrows raised, mouth parted open to speak, but nothing else. Hector wipes at the back of his mouth, a few tears following, but he sits up as best he can, coughing some to get the congestion and pain out of the way. "Arizona and I watched them both grow up," he says. "We trained them to be ready to fight against any occurrence, but I suppose betrayal and mirrored hallways didn't count," he shakes his head. "I'm not married, and I don't have kids. Hero and Victoria have so far been the closest thing to a son or daughter," Hector locks his jaw, looking away. "And now they're dead..."

Calhoun reaches a hand out to him, and the victor looks at the limb as if it is radioactive. He has known the president for a very long time, and while there can be a bridled rage inside of the man, that rage is indeed put under control and seldom shown. Calhoun has a heart of gold, thrust into a political position he truly didn't want, but over the years, his ambition turned into reality and into truth. Traditions that have bore into his soul have made a bit of the sparkle darken, deepen the glimmer somewhat, but not enough to wash out all of the shine.

The president pats Hector's hand, nodding his head. "I'm sorry," he says. "I'm sorry that the arena did this. That the Games have done this." He clears his throat once more, straightening that same damn tie - it does not go unnoticed by Hector's ever watchful eyes, even after downing half a bottle of whiskey that will reappear in the toilet in a few hours, certainly - before resting his hands flat in front of him, equidistant from another, equidistant to his elbows. "I wanted to speak with you about something. Something dangerous."

That perks Hector's attention. He may not be stupid, but dangerous is very well his middle name. He swallows, his eyes meeting Calhoun's and he sits up as straight as he can, the chair creaking underneath the movement. "Dangerous? What kind of danger are we talking about here?"

Calhoun bites on the inside of his cheek. "The stability of the entire nation..." and then, another moving of the tie, the president's fingers nimbly taking the knot apart, pulling the tie free from around his neck, "Perhaps even a third war. A new Dark Days, even."

 _That_ really has his attention.

Not necessarily great, though.

"Who else knows about this?" Hector asks.

"Lewlyn. She's the only other one," Calhoun answers, and the victor's eyebrows rise in alarm. He does not trust Lewlyn Davis, Head Gamemaker extraordinaire with a ten foot pole, even if he could somehow see past her faults. It has been the whispering and gossip of the Capitol circle lately that she is trying to turn over some new leaf, amend relationships and try to extinguish the fires of her burnt relationships, but that is a process that is more easily said than done, despite her efforts, and although Hector has never been on the blunt end of her rage or insanity, he can only imagine how hard it must be to forgive a she-devil such as Lewlyn. "As crazy as that sounds and as insane as this sounds," the president continues, "I trust her with it."

Part of Hector wants to advise Calhoun to stop trusting some psychopathic redhead with a trigger-like mindset, but if he's being told this dangerous information, he surely must've already spilled the beans to Lewlyn, who knows what he - Hector - is about to find out right now. "Why am I the second person you're telling? If this involves the safety of Panem, I can think of a few who are more suited for this information."

"I trust you, and you're also one to help temper the worst of the impulses," Calhoun explains. "Lewlyn, with her new take on life and seeking to improve herself took to the idea immediately. Out of all the victors, as this does concern you, I trust your opinion more than anyone. More than your brother, more than Hale Cornerstone, more than Kevia Janelle, and even more than old Ellison," the president's gaze is very serious. "More than anyone's Hector."

"What is it, then? What is it you want to do that is so dangerous?"

The president doesn't bat an eye, and Hector is really glad he drank that entire last half of that bottle of whiskey, as he is about to nearly chuck it all back up his windpipe, and perhaps he can blame the next statement that comes out of Calhoun's mouth up to the delusion of being tipsy, mayhaps even drunk.

"How about the end of the Hunger Games? Is that dangerous enough?"

* * *

 ** _Bonnie Rodney: Head Designer of the Mutts P.O.V_**

* * *

She does not want to spend her evening back in the mansion. The largeness of the building gives her anxiety, and with her husband's constant coddling over their presumable child makes her want to puke. She's pregnant. Bonnie isn't deathly ill, and she most certainly isn't incapacitated. Instead, Bonnie finds herself wrapped up in a dark black shawl, as it is surprisingly cold outside, and she knocks on the door to Pollux's room. There's the sound of swearing that happens shortly after her knock, and maybe the sound of something tipping over, but shortly soon after the door is opened and there he stands, there stands Pollux in the doorway.

"Oh, uh... hello!" he exclaims rather surprised, draping one arm over his chest. Pollux is shirtless, and Bonnie's eyes drape all over the man. Perfectly toned, even moreso than Calhoun, and she has always enjoyed her husband's physique. However, perfection bores her. It has always made her yawn; it feels too artificial, it feels too fake. She finds that rather hysterical, actually, at how her job with the Hunger Games is to design monsters that look a thousand percent perfect, yet when there is perfection plastered onto a human being, it bothers her.

"May I come in?" she asks.

"Certainly; come on in!" Pollux invites her in, pushing his door all the way. He keeps his arm draped over his chest, and she gives another quick glance at him. The bruises around his neck are starting to fade, as it has been a few days since she's last seen him. He's been prepping for the final eight interviews, which Bonnie is certain will begin sometime very soon, mayhaps even tomorrow, as the tributes have been dropping like flies rather quickly, at a much quicker rate than what has happened before, with one or two dying a day, things move faster.

She almost cannot believe she even thought that.

"You gonna put a shirt on?"

"Does it bother you?" Pollux frowns.

Bonnie smiles, but there is manticore venom hiding behind the moving of her muscles, where her teeth sharpen into fangs, where those fangs will rip flesh into shreds and pieces. "I'm married," she says, as if that is some sort of good reasoning; a many people cheat on their significant other regardless of them being already sewn at the hip. She has a bit of class, a bit of decorum. "I wouldn't want anything to do with you," and there's a slight raise of Pollux's eyebrows at that, to which she quickly adds, "I didn't mean anything negative by that."

"I'm sure you didn't," he shrugs his shoulders, closing the door, and wandering off into his bedroom to get a shirt.

Bonnie is pretty sure that the Head Interviewer is gay as is, and last she's checked, there hasn't been a line of homosexual men waiting to get a chance to sleep with her, as if she'd ever allow that. She unravels her shawl around her neck, setting it on the couch, sitting down shortly after. There's a slight crunching noise that the couch makes when she sits on it, as if there is something beneath her being crushed. She frowns, running a hand down in between the cushions, her fingers dashing over something seemingly jagged. The president's wife hisses lowly, sure that she just cut herself, but it is nothing serious. Fishing out the strange object, Bonnie holds to the light a shard of glass.

What are shards of glass doing beneath his couch?

Pollux reemerges from his bedroom, dressed in a light white shirt, almost see through, most likely to be cheeky, as Bonnie makes special mention of the notion. How he dangles the carrot in front of her face, only to rip it away, right? Bonnie wishes she didn't feel so ambivalent about everything in her life; it'd make stalwart decisions that much more important.

"Can I get you anything to drink?" he asks. "Wine good?"

"No, thanks," it must be the apocalypse if Bonnie Rodney, the Capitol darling, refuses alcohol. She pats her belly, now a week into her pregnancy, and all the signs have been proven; all the signs are showing a child, and she couldn't be happier. "It wouldn't be good for the baby."

He nods, letting out a light sigh. "Ah, right. I keep on forgetting," Pollux shakes his head, scoffing.

"What?" Bonnie frowns.

"It just feels surreal, is all," he says. "You having a child. You having a child _with_ Calhoun."

She sits back on the couch some, grabbing the shawl and running the fabric through her fingers. "Is that an insult to me or Calhoun?"

Pollux shows her a smile filled with teeth. Razor sharp teeth, like that of a shark from those in the scientific picture books she sees in the presidential library. Bonnie has always had a fascination with nature, and it is in part why she is so eager to jump into the driver's seat in being the head designer for the mutts over the last few years. "Take it however you want."

He continues to talk, but Bonnie isn't listening to what he says. She rather drowns him out, watching his lips move, a flaring seed of jealousy burns within her. She cannot seem to stop looking at his lips, rosy in color, liquidous and succulent, as Pollux brings a glass of wine to his lips, watching the murky violet liquid vanish beneath a curtain of bliss. The flaring seed erupts into that of an volcanic release, as she connects the wine to a different color, to a brighter red. To _Rennie._ How Rennie Davis has kissed those lips, how Pollux Aetos has killed Rennie Davis's lips, and Bonnie can't seem to get a single peck in without being pushed away. She's never known Rennie to have some sort of deviant thoughts - she is not condemning the ex-Avox's actions, only puzzled by them - as Bonnie has always been sure that Rennie fancied her, and fancied her alone and never fancied anyone else beyond that.

Only to find out just a week ago that the two men slept together, then to find out a few days later of Lewlyn's involvement - any time Bonnie thinks of that red-haired bitch her blood begins to boil; she's never felt a more direct hatred to anyone else in her life, how someone can break all the rules and her judgmental husband does nothing to stop it - and the divide that causes, the ripples that flow. Bonnie can feel those same ripples underneath her own skin, watching as moles and birthmarks move a few millimeters over. Her pulse is a roaring flame, a fire that dances in the wind, and that fire consumes her entire soul, where the edges of her vision are lit aglow in an amber color.

The Head Interviewer offhandedly says something, and that breaks Bonnie out of her immersion.

"What?" she shakes her head.

Pollux purses his lips, one hand running through his hair, which he pauses said motion. God, Bonnie quakes in her outfit. "Something wrong?"

"What was it you just said?"

"I said that I'm honestly very happy for you and Calhoun. Everyone is," he smirks, finishing the rustling of his hair, going and taking a seat across from her. "Even Lewlyn."

Bonnie raises an eyebrow. "Even Lewlyn?"

"Even her," Pollux takes a sip of his wine. "The entire administration wants to jump up and down because you two finally have a child. Thought of any names?"

"Some," she admits. Bonnie hates all of them. None of them please her, as it is what Calhoun wants their baby to be, and not the other way around. Rosaline. Jacki. Hinson. Evan. Marcos. Quincy. All of these names are ones her husband thinks of when he is in his cups. Bonnie wants something airy, something light, something that simply rolls off the tongue, but a name also unique enough without getting outlandish or into the sort of dichotomy of District 1 names... because who names their child Quartz? Apparently, as Bonnie is aware, some in District 1. "None of them have stuck yet."

"I just can't believe you guys will be parents..."

"I'm still pinching myself," Bonnie smiles lightly. She looks away for a second, down at another cushion on the couch, and remembers that she is sitting on glass. Walking on glass. Tiptoeing on glass. "I don't know how happy I am about it, though," and this seems to break the record playing in Pollux's head, at which he frowns, about to open his mouth. That came out entirely wrong. "I mean, of course I'm happy, I'm pregnant and we've been trying since forever. I guess that is what makes it bittersweet," she rubs her arm. "Calhoun has always made me feel pretty terrible about not being able to really conceive children. We'd get started, and I'd lose the baby soon after, just a few months in, because all the signs went wrong. We'd get our hopes up and then... well..."

"What makes this any different?" Pollux asks. He feigns a lighter expression. "Not to be negative, of course."

"It just is," Bonnie shrugs. "I can feel it."

She knows exactly why she feels better about this child then all of the rest, but it is not something the entire country needs to know; it very well might be a fact she'll keep to herself forever and ever, until she is old, weathered, and gray. Then, on her deathbed, will she tell her child a fragment of the truth, maybe... Bonnie isn't sure yet.

"Well, whatever you end up naming them, I know that you guys will choose wisely."

Bonnie nods, but once again, she isn't really listening. It has occurred to her, with she being away from the mansion, that she has no idea what her husband is doing tonight. Would she be back in her bedroom or the study like normal, everyone's comings and goings are told to her by the presidential guard. Being told what happens inside the mansion honestly does nothing good or bad to her well being, but Bonnie likes the thought put into it.

With her away, there's no guard to speak to.

Her husband could be creating the seeds of rebellion in his office right now and she wouldn't even know it.

Her husband could be aligning the upmost perfect murder and she wouldn't even know it.

In all honesty, does she even know Calhoun Rodney anymore? Did she ever?

Bonnie speaks without even meaning to. "Pollux," she says, sounding rather disturbed, and Pollux immediately freezes, wine glass in mid-tipping motions, "I don't think I want Calhoun to be the father of my baby..."

His eyes widen in alarm. "Are you saying that the child isn't his?"

She scowls. "I don't cheat!" Bonnie snaps. Then, with an at ease tone of voice, "Just... with how obsessed Calhoun has been about having kids, and a legacy and tradition... is that really the male role model my child needs? In a place where we foster independence and thought?" she bites on the inside of her cheek. "I just don't know if parenthood will be good for Calhoun. He's already father of the country..."

Pollux shakes his head. "Calhoun and I are best friends, Bonnie. I know him like the back of my hand," _Oh I bet you do,_ Bonnie thinks smartly, _how he tastes with his cock around your mouth, huh?_ "He's gonna be a great father, Bonnie, and you'll be an amazing mother."

"Thank you," she says. "Thank you, Pollux."

Bonnie doesn't believe one word that comes out of the Head Interviewer's mouth; it is his job to talk with a silver tongue, after all.

She doesn't even believe one word that comes out of her own mouth, at this rate.

Bonnie Rodney has no idea what she even believes in anymore.

* * *

 ** _Hale Cornerstone: Victor of the 87th Hunger Games_**

* * *

Even though she's heard the noise a thousand and one times, Hale still jumps when the elevator dings again after taking the step down from her floor to the first floor. She can feel the Capitol's very breath crawl up and down her skin, and it makes Hale want to take a bath and never ever go outside again, to be surrounded by the creepiest and ugliest of folk that she's ever seen. Hale hates them all, hates every single Capitol man, woman, and child, and sometimes that means she has to hate herself, since she often finds herself wrapped up deeply in cahoots with whatever schemes the outlandish citizens of the Capitol cook up.

If the entire place could go up in smoke and flames, Hale would very much appreciate that. Watching the platinum and diamond encrusted stone buildings go up in flame, when the embers dance in her eyes and the ash rises and billows into sand dunes in the streets, that'd very much bring joy to her heart. As much as she appreciates and likes the presidential royal family, she wouldn't mind watching them burn as well; watching as their corpses become simple bone, where even that can melt away. Call her a psychopath, sure, but Hale cannot even think of a single person in her life that would want to keep the Capitol thriving, the people that cheer for their bloodlust.

She misses Arizona - a rather non-sequitur jump, but she could care less - and that feeling has been very strong today. He's stayed somewhat distant from the Mentor Viewing Center for the day, which is understandable, since neither District 10 tribute is alive in the arena. Usually that means the victors go on home, since they have absolutely zero reason to stay in the Capitol, and the mentors of Districts 3, 6, 8, and 9 have all packed ship. Beyond that, it is just Hector and Arizona left, and they seem to be leeches, never wanting to let go, sucking the blood out of everything.

Hale knows exactly why her husband has stayed behind: for her. For his wife. It is what a good husband does, but she cannot help but feel angry with him, since every second they spend close together puts their life in danger, a dangerousness that seems to creep closer and closer as each day goes by. Persephone is still alive - as of Hale thinking of this, it is only nine or ten at night, her tribute could very well die before the start of the new day - and that means Hale must stay, and wherever she goes, her husband goes too. It's headstrong. It's reckless. It's dangerous.

It makes her absolutely crazy about him. Hale cannot help but find Arizona even more attractive than when he does that, even though it means everything is on the line. She can taste copper in the back of her mouth.

The victor of the 87th Hunger Games steps into the foyer of the District 1 apartment. It is always disconcerting to her that the layout of every apartment is always the same on each floor, with every piece of furniture being colored the exact way. Somehow, the tiling of the granite countertops is even the exact same, as some victor with too much time on their hands focuses on this piece one day while waiting for the tribute to die of starvation. Hale likes to conjure up that perhaps it might be some gullible trick, but it is not. Exact.

To the T.

If Lance's words were to be correct, Kevia would be just now getting into the shower, and she'd stay in for a good lasting while, twenty minutes minimum, thirty minutes maximum. She'd lock her door, in case an Avox went snooping. Hale pats the key that Lance gives her, which is in her pocket, keeping one hand firmly around it so it does not jangle as she walks. The keys given to each victor work for every door on their floor, so Kevia's key opens Lance's, and his visa versa.

Get inside Kevia's room. Snoop. Discover evidence. Get out. All without the victor from District 1, likely to pull a knife on Hale's throat, finding out.

Piece of cake, right?

Hale killed kids. She should be able to do this.

She walks by an Avox that is standing in the dead center of the kitchen, and she nods as she walks by. The Avox mirrors the same motion, but deep inside, in her heart, although it makes her feel like an absolute piece of shit, Hale is so relieved that Avoxes cannot speak. A mute man can share no secrets, and she's sure they'd be too afraid to betray her anyways.

Her mind runs at all the possibilities, Lance's words vibrating in her skull. Why would Kevia even want to betray her to Bonnie? As far as Hale knew, and perhaps she's been wrong this entire time, then, that she and Kevia were friends. They may not have been the _best_ of friends, but Hale knows herself as someone who causes too much damage to keep anyone that close to her heart in that manner. What would the victor gain for trading secrets? In fact, Hale wants to know, how would _Kevia_ of all victors have this information? Besides Hector, there wasn't a single soul in the Capitol who knew of her and Arizona's marriage.

Hale has to pause, in the dead center of the living room in the apartment, letting out a shaky sigh. She can feel the forceps of Arizona's fingers opening her in two, down from the spot where her kidneys are, to traveling up the ribcage, he kissing lightly like a ghost. His lips slide over the ridges in her spine, swiping upwards at the ball of her neck, and Hale shakes.

She squeezes her eyes shut, trying to not sway over. She cannot get stuck in her own head right now. This is life or death right now, if Lance is to be true. This is life or death for her and her husband, and for her two children. Children that could end up in unmarked graves, or without a mother, or without a father. Hale looks back at the Avox she makes eye contact with, said Avox never taking their eyes off of her - she cannot tell their gender, looking too unrecognizable for her - and that stare bores into her skin. Judgment. Fright. Pain. Terror. Rage.

The victor steps down the hallway for the mentors, outlined by a fancier gleam to the shine on the wooden floors. The female mentor/victor door has always been on the left side. Unlike the tributes, the showers are not adjacently attached to their room, instead a shared one that continues down the hall. Hale steps up to Kevia's door, evidently noted by having the woman's name written on a gold colored plaque in black calligraphy.

Hale unlocks the door, hearing the sound of the shower distantly, and Kevia's voice rising on the wind. Singing. Kevia Janelle, a girl who slit people's throats... singing in the shower. Hale feels oddly disturbed at that, goosebumps sliding over her skin. She gently closes the door behind her, now standing in the corner of Kevia's bedroom. The furniture, as she noted earlier, is the exact same in every apartment. Mentors sleep in king size beds, on frames constructed by the hands of Daedalus himself, wrapping themselves up in sheets of velvet, breathing in the fresh scent of lavender and newly washed linens.

Last she recalls, Lance told her that Kevia had whatever she had been writing resting on the desk provided. She scans the room quickly for it, eyes landing squarely on a large piece of paper sitting there, all folded up nice and neat, like it had been ready to be sent to someone. Her heart jumps into her throat, and her pulse quickens faster than she's ever felt it. This is a scarier time for her than being pinned down by the Career girl from District 4, trying to impale her with a knife.

She picks up the letter, ripping open the official Panemian seal, and the paper is hot in her hands, and she nearly drops it, as if it is radioactive.

Hale begins to read the first line, and her eyes widen.

 _To whom it may concern, Bonnie Rodney,_

 _As I said at the café, I did have information. As long as I can tell, for at least a few years, Hale Cornerstone and Arizona Merviere have been together romantically against the wishes of-_

Hale does not get to read further, as she notices a very faint change in the times. She cranes her neck to hear it, and her blood turns to ice. Kevia's stopped singing in the shower. The shower has stopped running. Kevia's done with her shower. The victor crumbles up the letter in her hands, shoving it into her pocket, trying to keep it bunched up as she can without it being beyond obvious.

She closes Kevia's door and relocks it, scrambling away from the hallway as quick as she can, dashing back into the kitchen.

Her quick actions make the Avox jump, but at this point, Hale could care less about that. She squeezes her eyes shut, heart hammering in her chest. Someone knows. Kevia knows. Someone knows, and they're willing to tell Bonnie Rodney, someone who could most definitely do something about it. Kevia knows, and she's willing to tell Bonnie Rodney, someone who would most definitely do something about it to help her husband stay as president for as long as she could.

She wants to puke.

The sound of the bathroom door opening and closing makes its presence known in the apartment, Kevia whistling some sort of tune to herself that sounds awfully out of pitch.

Hale stands up, smothering her pants, switching the key from pocket to another.

"Hello?" she calls. "Anyone here?" Hale presses herself against the elevator door as tight as she can without setting off the sensor.

The whistling ceases, and stepping into the foyer is Kevia, followed by a wave of steam. The District 1 victor is cloaked in a white towel, her vivacious blonde hair thrown up into another towel on her head. She purses her lips, freezing at the entrance of the mentor hallway.

"Hale?" she blinks, frowning. "What are you doing here? It's late."

"Sorry..." Hale smiles sheepishly, digging into her pocket, pulling out Lance's key. "I went back to the Viewing Center to check up on Persephone and Milor; it looks like Lance had left his key behind, so I wanted to bring it back."

Kevia, still cloaked in her towel, walks over, and it takes all of Hale's mental will to not shank the victor with the metal object straight through the heart as she approaches. "Thanks, then," the woman's tone sounds realistic enough. "I'll tell him you stopped by." Their knuckles brush up against one another, and Hale recoils sharply. Kevia frowns, obviously seeing this, but she doesn't say anything. "Good night."

"Night," Hale nods, and then she hurriedly makes her way over to the elevator door, smashing the button with her fist.

Once inside the slate cube, Hale presses herself on the far wall, hoping for the metal to swallow her whole.

All she can think of is this.

She's been betrayed.

Her husband has been betrayed.

Kevia knows she'll be doing the betrayal.

If only she never ever met her husband that one stupid night.

The ding of the elevator swallows her screams whole.

* * *

 **Well everyone, that was Chapter #36: Matters Best Left Alone for the OC Capitol storyline, and this train is not stopping for a single person. Calhoun now has spilled the idea to Hector on ending the Hunger Games, Bonnie seems to have regrets, and the victors are going to be at an impasse. I know it would be amazing to have everyone just get along and stuff like that, but then we wouldn't have a story, right? I found it quite ironic, actually, that Valencia and Persephone - RIP - had such a beautiful relationship, and here we're with Kevia and Hale and the two women absolutely hate one another, to the point where Kevia is going to try and throw Hale under the bus and get her in legal trouble all to save her own skin. Wow, right?**

 **Beyond that, Chapter #37: A Gaze Through the Trees is going to be another tribute centric chapter, with four POV's, and I am really hoping to have that out before the end of the month, which is the 31st, and I will work my ass off to reach that, as there's something big planned for that chapter ya'll, and when I say big, I mean, _really big._ Any late game predictions for the Capitol storyline? I'm curious as to what you all think. With digression, that was Chapter #36. I shall see you all very soon for Chapter #37. Please review; they'd really help me out with the direction of my story, and I really appreciate/enjoy having and reading the feedback. I love you all so much! Have a great day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	37. A Gaze Through the Trees (Day 6)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #37: A Gaze Through the Trees, which will be Day 6, and we're down to the final eight tributes (Valencia, Peri, Linden, Milor, Carrion, Colt, Caiden, and Annabellina), and last arena chapter, at 35, we sadly lost our dear Persephone, a tribute I actually cried for writing her death sequence, burnt up to a crisp by our resident District 5 schizophrenic... and our final eight will turn into one, and any of them can become victor, they all contain inside somewhere the ability to become victor material... and it all depends on ya'll, my faithful and fellow readers and submitters. These arena chapters are gonna be a bit shorter, somewhere in the 8k-9k range, versus spiraling higher into the double digits like I've done before, as alas, we're losing people. Enjoy Chapter #37: A Gaze Through the Trees.**

* * *

 ** _Milor Drusus: District 2 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

The smell remains inside his skull. It is what lingers after the smoke has cleared, after the screams have dissipated from his head, and as the sight of his district partner, his faded flower, _burns_ alive before his very eyes. He screams likewise, as Valencia is telling them to move, as he's unsure what exactly is causing Persephone to combust, as if her skin is paper mache. Does a dragon exist in the park now? Is that the Gamemakers plan, at the top nine? Top _eight..._ and that thought sends a chill through his body. When his body seems to want to shutdown, Milor has to yell at himself to continue. Carrion is gimping a bit behind with his limp, but since he - Milor - is the one least battle-hardened, and still the most able mentally to wield his weapon, Valencia makes the District 4 Career bobble along on her shoulder.

They collapse somewhere in the arena, unknown, and Valencia doesn't know where the map is. She must've dropped it in their haste, but they've been running around with their heads cut off like chickens for the last hour, so it doesn't matter even if she tried to go back for it. Milor does eventually slam his knees down onto the concrete, digging his head into his chest and unleashing a scream. He thinks Valencia is crying in the corner, and Carrion tries unsuccessfully to smash a spear over his leg, instead injuring him even further. That snaps Milor out of whatever funk he is - the one that deals with seeing his best friend consumed in a death-bringing, amber liquid. That kind of funk. - and he rushes over to his boyfriend, screaming obscenities and insults.

It is late, now, around two or three in the morning, if the arena clock is to be believed, and here Milor Drusus is screaming at Carrion at the top of his lungs. _You stupid idiot! Why would you do that to yourself? Why would you injure yourself?_ Milor is a pissed off ball of emotions, where he grabs the other male Career by the shoulders and shakes him. It is the horrific look in Carrion's eyes, the one of wild and reckless abandon, that makes Milor pause, that makes him come to a stop. He steps back, trembling, shaking his head. He buries his head into his sternum, hot tears leaking from his eyes, streaming down his cheeks in crystalline rivers. Carrion stumbles down to one knee, the leg already wounded in his fight with Marcus now damaged further from trying to break the spear over his leg. Valencia, who is starting to wipe at her eyes, unleashes a light shriek, as in the pallor corpse light of the moon, Carrion's bandages can be seen starting to darken even worse than before.

A whirlwind of who knows what goes through Milor's head as Carrion sways back, falling onto the concrete with a light groan, eyes glassy, gaze dazed and confused. The seeping feel of anger washes away like granules of sand at the beach; he rushes forward, grabbing onto his boyfriend's hand. _You stupid idiot... you stupid, stupid idiot._ However, the tone is much more gentle, while Valencia tears off her jacket, applying as much pressure without making Carrion scream as she can to his leg, the navy leather turning into a more bleak crimson-like tone. Milor holds Carrion's head up, wanting to keep the blood flow as balanced as possible, and luckily the Career from District 4 shows no further signs of passing out, or smiling with blood-stained teeth.

Now, hours later, with Carrion in stable condition - or rather, as stable as he can be, having almost re-opened the wound entirely due to his antics - Milor rubs the dredges of sleep away as best he can. Valencia stays up, on guard always, sword in hand, eyes scanning the vicinity outwards like a leopard stalking the savannah for a fresh doe. He goes into the dream world muttering Annabellina's name on his lips. No one else in the arena had the sort of crazed laughter that she has.

His Persephone... gone. Snuffed out like a cigarette, like the ones his father would jam into his elbow when he would make loving eyes at another guy for a second far too long. His mother, who simply looks the other way, turning the other cheek, as it is the men in District 2 that are respected, that are militant, that are the ones to be _feared._ Not his Persephone, not his Seph. Her gemstone eyes that glitter like fresh amethysts simply look at his father as if he is another person in her way to glory, and she steps over whatever games he wishes to play. And now she's dead, his father still alive, his father not trapped in a death arena to kill friends and now... _loved ones._

Her screams still hang on the air, flesh swallowed whole by a dragon's scorching bite, and at the head of the beast, holding the trigger, the devil themselves, with a wicked grin. Milor, when he awakes, goes over to his sword, picking up the hilt. This very same blade, with the blood stains of Marissa still hinted at somewhere in the woven steel design no longer feels foreign. He knows that he had been prepared to kill, but as he had told Persephone in what seems like ages ago, that girl from Nine had been his first true kill, his first 'innocent' one. It felt odd, it felt alien... it felt unnatural.

 _Not this._

Carrion slowly becomes sentient again, his eyes opening, and Milor's heart is hit by a wave of relief. Waking up everyday, if it is somehow possible, with him, with Carrion... it'd be the one wish he would ask for if given the chance. Valencia has taken a short nap, only for an hour, and it is no longer the early hours of the afternoon anymore for them. It is the earliest they've ever awoken, Milor checking the arena time. It is 9:30, and that means business.

"I'm tired..." Carrion complains, as Valencia and Milor go sit by him for courtesy purposes.

"Get used to it," Valencia says smugly, trying to keep the morale up. It is fresh on their minds, what has just happened, and Milor will remember it until his last breath, as his district partner turns into smoke, ash, and blood. Fire and blood... _fire and_ _blood._ "We, when we were larger," she grimaces as she says this, and their names flicker through Milor's head quickly. _Victoria. Maisey. Hero. Marcus. Persephone._ Five gone... three remaining, in a Career pack that had been so large. "Would always leave around midday," she shakes her head. "Not anymore. We've been starting our hunts too late in the day, when everyone else has had their own adventures. We've been on the defense, especially after being blindsided by Marcus."

"We've been lousy Careers," Milor admits, nodding his head. That is painful for him to admit, as Milor has always seen himself as being the cream of the crop, as being one of the best of the best in technical terms, and now his track record has been pretty terrible, especially since he doesn't even have the highest kill count of the Games... that went to Marcus, as shitty as that is, it's the truth.

"Three versus five out there."

"Perhaps they've all joined against us," Carrion says dryly, flashing a smile.

That sends a feeling of irritability through Milor, he frowning and crossing his arms over his chest. He's known Carrion to be, well, _dry,_ but not to the point of negativity. He's the one laughing and cracking jokes, teasing and making fun of others, and then destroying the competition in the playful sparring matches. Carrion Bastion is not this shell of whatever Milor is staring at right now.

"It'd be three versus four if that's the case," Valencia acknowledges the possibility, rubbing her chin. "We know Annabellina acts alone. The others wouldn't be able to trust her, not with a broken and damaged mind."

"Who are our competition?"

Milor runs them through his head.

Nothing spectacular, when three-fifths of them really do not seem to have anything comparable in terms of fighting skills. Annabellina is different, having a flamethrower changes the game entirely, but if caught off guard like poor Persephone, she'll be mincemeat.

"Caiden, from District 11," he says.

"Sneaky, but not a fighter," Valencia comments.

"Colt, from District 12," Carrion adds.

"If Colt's a threat, then I'm straight," Milor chuckles to himself. He's seen how the gentle giant has held himself in the training center, stumbling over his own two feet as if he forgot how to walk, which is humorous in of itself. It may be one of the meanest things he's ever said out loud, but it's the truth, and Milor Drusus does not stumble away from the truth. He faces it head on.

 _Then what about your love interest? What about your boyfriend? The old president let Katniss and Peeta live. Look what it did to the country, what it did for those from your district? How many innocent lives died twenty-five years ago because two tributes were allowed to live? Would Calhoun Rodney grant you and Carrion the same amnesty?_ Milor blanches at the thought, looking away and disengaging from the conversation.

Where did that voice come from?

"Peri and Linden, from District 7," Valencia adds another two to the opposition list.

"I'm the most worried about them," Carrion says. "Even moreso now because I'm injured..."

"Why's that?" Milor looks at his boyfriend.

"They're actually pretty lethal. Marcus had said something about how Peri was all of a sudden super strong, and we know Linden isn't a slouch either. They were inseparable during training, and I'm sure they're still in an alliance in here. With me on my A-game, it wouldn't be a problem; we'd outnumber them. Now?" the Career winces to himself. "I am honestly not liking the chances."

"Colt, Caiden, Peri, and Linden," Valencia counts. "Leaving us with Annabellina."

Their corner of the arena darkens slightly, and Milor closes his eyes, trying to steady himself, overcome by rage. A burning rage that builds low in his gut, before igniting, erupting, and exploding all in one crevice in the deepest cave inside his soul. Annabellina Circuit, the bitch from District 5, the same person who roasted his district partner alive, ripped to shreds his best friend and laughed as she did it.

"Annabellina's mine," Milor hisses, tightening his grip on the sword. "She killed my district partner. She killed my best friend. She killed Persephone," and he looks at Valencia, he looks at Carrion, both of them slightly wide-eyed, mouths dropped open, as Milor is pretty sure he's never sounded this lethal. "She doesn't deserve mercy."

He turns away from them with a hiss, his wrist starting to hurt from how hard he clenches onto the sword.

If the arena thinks Milor Drusus is entirely innocent, think again.

If the arena and the Capitol and the districts think they've only seen a taste of his power, think again.

Milor Drusus is done being Mr. Nice Guy.

Time to become the man his father wanted him to be.

* * *

 ** _Colt Sheppard: District 12 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

He's been saying one name to himself for the last two days over and over again, saying it so many times now that when he closes his eyes and goes to sleep, all he can hear is his voice repeating the name of Caiden Grove in his head, on a record, on repeat, a constant running that never seems to stop. His voice seems to multiply, growing in strength, growing in magnitude as more and more people add their own tone to the choir, until it is the entire nation chanting for the death of Caiden Grove of District 11, the real reason his entire alliance has fallen, the real reason everything he has ever tried to do, from the first day to now, has failed.

Colt lies awake, staring at the trees, listening to the leaves being blown in the wind, listening to the chipmunks that eat on acorns, or the squirrels running up and down the tree trunks. Butterflies play together in the wind, flowers bloom and grow, and the arena bleeds around him, tributes falling to flamethrower fire or having their own throats ripped out by derelict poisons. All the while, as this goes on, Colt stews in himself. Colt sits and passes the wooden stick back and forth. It is sharper now, after having moved Alexandra's body for the hovercraft to pick up her body. He kisses her on the cheek, Alexandra's skin cold and blue to the touch. Whatever she had eaten, whatever it had corrupted... it does more than simply erode her throat.

The beautiful sunflower that Colt allies himself with, for only four days, is a corpse of pale flesh, dipped in a pool of moonlight, with sagging skin and fingers that bloat at the knuckle. Her singsong voice is abandoned to the wind, now only heard by the soil that bequeaths the ground, and his tears, from where they land, bloom their own grotesque formation, thorned roses with black tips, sorrow and pain radiating from the creation. Colt's throat is raw from screaming. It is not just for Alexandra, but for Gaia, and for Marissa, and for Rochelle, and even for his enemies, even for those he did not feel sympathy for long ago, even for the tributes that had been in his way.

It is a scream for the repressed in District 12, back home, watching their hero collapse at the joints until he is a Marionette doll hanging limply on his strings, a puppet who is dangling by a thread, lax in his swaying, face expressionless, until his maker finally gives way entirely, completely, dropping into a pool of acid. The first moment Colt gets, as far away from the cameras as he possibly can, vomit spews from his throat, the couple of breakfasts he's shared with his allies painting the sidewalk in sickly greens, and sour, almost tainted oranges, the smell like that of rotten fruit, which makes Colt gag and nearly puke more. It must be what the people in the Capitol wish to see, they must wish to see this strong form brought down so hard, brought to his knees and beheaded in front of gods and men.

Caiden's voice has been uttered from his lips so many times that Colt almost believes it to be his own name, simply distancing himself from the truth. At this point, it might be for the best, if he faces the facts. After all, it is Caiden Grove that has two kills under his belt, and Colt is incapable of even getting one no matter how hard he pushes himself. It is Caiden that destroys the alliance, removing the last piece of his sanity, as he watches his sand castle crumple underneath his hands, the granules glittering one last time before being swallowed up by the sea. It is Caiden that somehow is intelligent enough to create poison, let alone use it, and from what Alexandra has hinted at, this is not the first time.

What does Colt have to show for _himself?_ What would his mother be saying right now, to their friends? What would Grandmother Sheppard think to herself before turning off her bedside light? Do they want a disappointment in the Sheppard family anymore? Has he always been a disappointment? Colt's heart sinks into his stomach at the thought. That must be it. He must have always been such a failure, given everyone's looks of pity and sympathy that are thrown his way. He lost his father years and years ago to a sickness called the flu, that had taken his father in the heat of a midsummer day, and there were grievers that had come close, but that had been temporary.

It is the look of disappointment that has followed him from the moment he could remember picking up something heavy and dropping it, as it had been too heavy for him. Chips of pottery go everywhere, from the broken vase, and his mother spanks him that night as punishment, before watching as tributes are disemboweled for the Hunger Games, and all Colt can think of, as he goes to bed that night, holding the sheets close to his chest, is that his mother will do that one day to him if he destroys something even more valuable?

Is his mother's heart more valuable than a vase?

Colt has no sheets to cling onto, here in the arena, so he rips apart a leaf instead, throwing the tattered remains onto the ground. It is what he deserves, for failing so. In his first moment to prove himself, in front of Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis and the president's wife Bonnie Rodney, Colt has the chance to rise to greatness, and instead, he settles for mediocrity. He settles for average, from his six. That is the middle of the road, but there are hardly enough tributes beneath him to even _land_ at the halfway point, so Colt doesn't even achieve average.

Under performing, more likely.

He gets to his feet, having been laying down for the entire morning, simply stewing in his rage. Colt grabs the wooden spear next to him. It somehow feels heavier than the sword he had picked up earlier, if that is somehow even possible, but he doesn't want to question how that would even be the case. He bites on the inside of his lip, tearing away a bit of the flesh, copper rushing to fill the basin of his mouth, washed in a bitter liquid that he swallows down, grimacing at the taste.

Colt frowns, hefting the spear outwards some, as if he were to begin running with it to vault over an obstacle. Taking a fighting stance, as best as he can remember what one would look like, he imagines that there is someone standing in front of him, on their knees begging for mercy. Tears stream down the imaginary person's face, and they're pleading hard, but their words fall on deaf ears. He growls, lowering the spear, rushing forward, and drives the spear through the opponent's ribcage, lifting them up from the back of the spear, showering in their blood.

The tribute from District 12 shakes his head, relishing in the downpour, before the imaginary body falls to the ground, lifeless, crimson spilling out of them at a rate unlike what a human should bleed out at.

He turns again, brandishing the spear like a sword, as the tip is sharp enough now, being whittled and whittled and whittled away. Colt faces a tree this time, but instead of bark, Colt pictures a face. Caiden Grove's face. Everything Caiden Grove is, Colt Sheppard is not. Resourceful, unmerciful, challenging, frightening, and a killer. Colt isn't a killer, is he?

He may be the killer of dreams, perhaps, but he doesn't have any alcohol to start thinking deep like that; it is something he'll reserve for later.

Everything in Colt's veins screams at the hallucination of Caiden's force. Unleashing a roar of terror, Colt slices to the left, a quick cut then to the right, ripping the barked side of the tree to shreds, chips of wood flying everywhere as he continues to cut up the natural structure. The tribute is screaming, and he can hear these screams, laughing as he does it, snarling, foam spewing from his mouth. This is what the Capitol wants, right? They want to see killers come into their own, to see killers learn their true skills and then perform them on the enemies who deserve it the most.

That is what this Caiden is.

The person who deserves it the most.

Colt lets out a scream, throwing his wooden spear at the tree trunk. It embeds into the wood with a light twang, sticking out of place, before falling out of its wedge and onto the ground. The rage in his body vanishes into thin air like a puff of smoke, his chest rising and falling, blood roaring in his ears, as Colt stands in front of the tree, picturing a broken and dead Caiden Grove in front of him. This is beautiful.

Did he just do that?

Colt looks at the tree in a muted form of horror, and then down at his hands, which are in fact shaking, his fingers vibrating so much that he can see the oscillations. He likes it, Colt does, the way his soul ignites and erupts like a volcano, the way he can physically take someone else, some snapshot of someone in his life, and put them in front of him, on their knees, at his mercy... it makes his body go hot. His eyes dilate, and Colt stumbles forward, out of breath. More. He wants more... he wants _more of this,_ more of whatever the demon on the other end of the sword has to offer, with their extended and beckoning hand.

He grabs the spear and balances it between his two hands. He may not be as adept enough at melee combat like Milor or Carrion, but he knows that against Caiden, the one he is really searching for, this'll be enough. A contest of brute strength between someone who believes is an equal, until Colt pulls the faster hand and takes the District 11 male by surprise, shoving a spear through the back of his skull, and out through one of his eyes.

As far as he can tell, with nothing indicating he wouldn't have it, Colt remembers Marissa telling everyone how Caiden kills Marina, with the knife to the back, sword to the heart, and how he brutally shows no remorse from the dead. As far as he can tell, Caiden still has the sword, and never proved himself to be a master at that, which can happen. If Caiden still has the sword, then that means it is game over if all Colt can use is the wooden spear. Nature finds a way to fight back, and fight back it will. He knows it will.

Disarm Caiden, use the sword to kill him, and Colt's genuinely smiling. He hasn't genuinely smiled since the reaping, from what he can recall.

The poisoning biologist will only taste, fleetingly, like the bitterness of a fresh apple with juices spilling down his mouth, getting caught in the hairs that rest right underneath the lips.

Colt smiles to himself again, brandishing the spear, gazing through the trees.

The emerald way will soon be stained with the blood of Colt's enemies, mark his words.

All shall fear and tremble before him.

* * *

 ** _Carrion Bastion: District 4 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

For once, Milor's constant doting has not paid itself off in terms of being annoying, and he cannot believe - Carrion cannot, that is - that it took him six days to finally come to that conclusion. His prattling has come across as caring, and Carrion cannot believe how stupid he has been during the last six days. Trying to keep up with Valencia and Milor, as brisk as they are, in their relatively uninjured states, compared to his, is starting to become a problem. Tripping isn't an option, as it very well may drop him entirely out of commission, and Carrion is not about to do that.

"Maybe you should leave me here," he says, waving his hand in some nondescript fashion, struggling to even get to his feet, balancing on the blunt end of the spear as leverage.

"Are you crazy?" Milor makes a face, half distorted between a scowl and a smile. "We're not leaving you behind. It's become clear to us, with Annabellina running around that staying in camp won't work," he looks off to the side, a hand clenched into a fist, Milor locking his jaw. "She hunts at night, and that means we need to constantly be on the move."

"You think you'd be able to defend yourself if you were left alone?" Valencia asks, throwing her sword into a hilt that is strapped up against her back. Carrion goes to protest about how dare she presumptuously call him weak, but she raises a hand, her hair blowing in the breeze. "I didn't mean anything bad by that, Carrion. I'm just saying... if _you're_ saying that you're having trouble standing and walking, leaving you behind in such a position is probably not the best, especially if you can't get to your feet and have us defend you."

Milor clamps one hand on Carrion's shoulder, leaning in and pressing his forehead up against the other Career's. Carrion inhales his boyfriend's scent, that of rosemary and idealism. "If you think there's a chance in hell I'm letting you stay anywhere in this arena by yourself, you're dead wrong," he presses a quick kiss to Carrion's temple, giving a slight smile, the returning form of Milor Drusus's gentler nature. "Come on, let's go hunt some tributes."

It has been about an hour now of this constant walking, and Carrion is exhausted, he needs a break. What he needs, realistically, but will never be given it, is a bed. A nice bed to lay in, with sheets that smell of ivory, and a velvet blanket to throw atop of him. He needs disinfectant, he needs magical healing ointment, and honestly... he needs Persephone alive.

Carrion isn't so sure he'll be entirely able to keep Milor whole and down to the ground, the way Persephone did, the way she managed to soothe and rub the stress circles out of his boyfriend's back. How she speaks to him in tongues, in a whole different language than what he can comprehend. He and Milor may share spit and lock tongues, and perhaps connect in a manner of romance, but his boyfriend, and his boyfriend's district partner... that is a love entirely otherworldly. The way Milor's voice snaps earlier in the morning, after running and running and getting nowhere... Carrion has never seen that sort of rage from anyone, perhaps not even himself.

He thinks back, just two days ago, when he slams Marcus's head down onto a jagged piece of glass, the shard going through the other tribute's head. That in itself is a brutal way to die, versus simply stabbing the traitor and having that be the end. Carrion looks over at Milor - rather, at the back of the District 2 male's head, since he's lagging behind, as Milor is conversation with Valencia - and a shiver runs through him. He remembers, two days ago, as he's being bandaged, of his fear, which may come from a place of irrationality, of what his rage and anger could do. Now, as that chill makes the hair on his arms stand on edge, a darker thought corrupts him mind.

What will happen when Milor's rage gets the best of him? What will happen when Milor unleashes the dark beast trapped behind the invisible, but very much there, iron bars? From the sound of the District 2 male's voice, Carrion believes that if Milor gets his hands on Annabellina, it'll be a fate, a _death_ worse than being thrown onto a jagged piece of glass.

Carrion wonders, for a brief second, what is going on back home in District 4. Maisey's body must've already been cleaned out and sent back in that decrepit wooden box. He's seen one of the boxes, but not the corpse inside, years ago, starting out as a fledgling in the Career training program. The head trainer at the time does the honors of removing the lock that holds the cover in place, and the moment the cover is removed and the box's contents are exposed to the world, the man turns over and pukes, vomit spilling out onto a seventeen year-old's shoes, the smell of death ripe and filling the room.

That head trainer is later executed only a few weeks later for treason at the hands of the Head Peacekeeper on the steps of the Justice Building, every citizen in the district forced to attend the public beheading. Treason of that manner, especially in the districts, used to simply be being shot in the back of the head. Quick, painful, but over in seconds, while the beheading has the tried and guilty staring at the executioner's block, before some sharp and jagged object cuts off the appendage.

He also wonders why anyone would, especially in District 4, from a place of power, wish to rebel or cause any treasonous acts. When he looks at his hands, he sees capability, Carrion witnesses the personal strength deep inside of him that is his and only his, and there's no way anyone will ever take that away from him. A quick and sure way to die is to start performing rebellious acts against the Capitol, against the very system that lives and breathes and gives life to Panem, as without it, District 4 would be a former shell of itself, given a hand up from the creator and lifted high in front of all.

Whatever road Carrion's thoughts were leading him down silence themselves to pipsqueaks when he, Valencia, and Milor cross the threshold of their section of the arena. They are back at the obelisk, the diamond obelisk where they had camped for a few days, and this spot is where the beginning of the end started.

Valencia unsheathes her sword, but does not get into a fighting stance. Carrion hobbles up to Milor the best he can, his boyfriend giving him a quick look to the side.

"You doing alright?" Milor asks.

"Never better," Carrion hisses. He's lying, but what Milor doesn't know won't hurt him. The pain is starting to get there. He is starting to see bright blips of red on the corner of his vision, and the lifting of his feet into an actual, physical step, is starting to slow. "I'm doing alright."

Valencia looks back at the two guys, and then back at the obelisk. Carrion can read her face, he can read the confusion that is spread all over. Something is different about the area, and it in fact is not the obelisk.

"Guys, what is that thing?" and she points to it.

Sitting at the base of the obelisk, facing them, is from what Carrion surmises to be a gigantic trash can. It is taller than him by another foot or so, half the width of the base of the obelisk, which is large enough in itself. There's a button in the very center of the aluminum block, as when Valencia taps it with the hilt of her sword, it makes a dull noise that echoes rather loudly through the arena, causing Carrion to wince. It's hollow, and the metal slightly crumples at her touch.

Milor helps him hobble up to Valencia, and before their very eyes, the surface of the rusted tin can smooths itself out as if she never had even hit it.

"What do you think it is?" Milor frowns, keeping his sword down low in his hand, ready to attack if whenever possible.

"Well, I think it looks like a trash can," Carrion observes, ever the purveyor of the obvious.

"You think or you know?" Valencia rolls her eyes.

"Should we press the button?"

"When has that ever gone well for anyone who pushes anything red?" Milor takes a slight step back, grabbing at Carrion with him. The button is painted a rather luscious cardinal red, like a fresh cherry, and it makes Carrion's stomach rumble.

Valencia bites on the inside of her cheek, nodding her head. "Yeah, you're right," she takes a look behind her. "We've been walking for an hour, and we haven't found anything. Should we head back? I think every tribute is simply roving, no one's camping anymore."

"I don't think it'd hurt," Milor shrugs.

Carrion likes the sound of that, truthfully. He needs rest. He needs a bottle of vodka. He needs Milor's mouth attached to his. He goes to turn around, but trips over his feet some, stumbling to the ground. Milor manages to catch him in his fall, but it still downs him to one knee. In order to not have the sharp spear tip go through his or anyone else's eyes, he thrusts the spear backwards some in his grip. However, heard as clear as day, something behind him goes _click._

Valencia freezes, looking back at the gigantic trash can. Milor helps Carrion to his feet, and when he pulls away the spear, registering the noise in his head, he turns too, his blood turning to ice.

The red button is pushed all the way in.

"Did- did you do that?" Milor's voice catches in his throat.

Carrion's throat is feeling pretty dry as well. "I- uh... I don't- I don't know."

Valencia, ever the bright and courageous commander, takes a step forward towards the can, perhaps to reverse the button push. She extends a hand out to touch it when the entire aluminum structure, as large as it is, begins to shake rapidly. She lets out a scream, Carrion and Milor both jumping back, the Career from Four stumbling once more, but this time he does not fall.

All three Careers line up together as well as they can, the trash can vibrating so fast, and so hard, that Carrion can feel the gentle tremors beneath his feet. The trash can makes a terrible, god awful grinding noise, and then _awakes._ Valencia lets out another whimper, and Milor a swear word that'd make grandmothers sneer, as the metallic structure has seven holes begin to appear through the mesh. Two at the sides, two underneath, one on the top, and two smaller ones near the top. Two halcyon eyes peer out of the darkness, extending from the holes on the side, arms made out of tube-lining, freshly coated in black paint as drops splatter onto the sidewalk.

The three of them back up even further, as two more elongated, tube-lined pieces extend from the bottom, acting as legs, bringing the trash can up to a few extra feet, now physically, and quite literally towering over them. Carrion trembles, trying to keep himself upright, trying to back as far away as he can to get a clear shot with his spear. Lastly, another tube extends from the top of the trash can, and rises another cube, smaller in size, as the halcyon eyes rise up to take its place.

 _Oh god._

Carrion just awoke a mutt.

The halcyon eyes search, and the Careers hold their breath. It snaps its gaze downward, the eyes lock up on Valencia, on Carrion, on Milor, and then the structure _roars._ A guttural roar, and as it roars, the trash can extends its head back, jagged, sharp lined teeth snapping into place out of pockets of their own.

Valencia doesn't even need to utter a command any more.

The Careers all run for their lives.

* * *

 ** _Annabellina Circuit: District 5 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

She's done it again.

Annabellina Circuit has crossed off of another tribute from the list, and her kill counter has risen from _1_ to _2,_ and she is now more Abe than Annabellina, who is rejoicing. She laughs, she laughs harder than she ever has in her life, watching as the amber liquid streams out of the flamethrower, hearing the screams of the deceased and the soon to be deceased joining her laughter on the wind. She stands there for a few minutes, after the damage has been done, after the cannon has been fired, smelling the smoke, inhaling it into her lungs, and breathing it all in.

The corpse continues to burn, the flames slowly dying away, and Annabellina watches as the fire eats away flesh, turning poor, beautiful Persephone, someone Annabellina admired, into a charred, ruinous piece of charcoal. Abe wants to celebrate, to grab a bottle of beer and chug it down, and that gives her zero solace. When she wanders off, running in pursuit after the other Careers who ran tail away from her instead of fighting head on, Annabellina begins laughing again, occasionally triggering the flamethrower and watching as the cardinal wave consumes a tree here, or a sign hanging from an awning there, and all around her, the arena burns in fire and blood.

When she stops to rest, having exhausted herself, Annabellina's skull is pounding, the adrenaline coursing in her veins, and this is what Abe had been speaking about. He does not shut up inside her head, and she's unable to go to bed, with Abe stomping around the cranial lobes, chanting, hitting his chest, and feeling his heartbeat drum underneath his chest, as she places a hand up to hers.

"This is but a taste, my dear child..." he whispers, touching the side of her face gently, fingers cold to the touch.

She shudders underneath his grip. " _A taste well deserved,_ " she tells her counterpart, her darker side grinning evilly, before waving his hand away to dismiss her.

Slumber takes to Annabellina like a baby holding a pacifier, never dropping the object out of their grip, and soon she's off to dream about amber liquid coursing from cans, the screams of the unwanted filling her nightmares, and she dreams of home, of District 5, where ash falls in every corner that is without space, and where skeletons line the streets. When the first rays of sunlight fall upon her face, Abe shouting in her ear that it is game time, Annabellina shoots up straight like a rocket, nearly resuming her laughter.

There's only eight left now, including her. The final eight. She has reached it. She's survived past five Careers, her district partner, and countless others that no doubt counted her out, that never thought insane, schizophrenic Annabellina Circuit would make it this far, and the taste of victory, the first morsels to hit her lips... they are _euphoric._ Even everlasting paradise does not have the same sense of sweetness.

She grabs the flamethrower, and resumes her hunting, as the early bird gets the worm. No tribute left is up at 7:30 in the morning, but she is, and Abe's rage flows through her veins. As she walks, in which Abe is too caught up in the madness to care, the dread sinks in into Annabellina's skin. She's killed someone... and she killed a Career, at that, Persephone Castor. Occasionally, she stops, pressing a hand to her forehead, her skin slick with sweat, mingling more sweat elsewhere, her heartbeat constantly playing in her head to remind herself where she is. She's in the end of the world, _her world,_ and if she thought District 5 would be disgusted by her back when the worst thing she did is shove a knife through Lowelle's stomach and nearly out her back, burning someone alive may make that ten times worse.

Annabellina does not crumple to her knees. That is a surefire way to catch Abe's attention, and that is the last thing she needs to have on her tail right now, lest she want it to be the end of her. She wanders from one sector to the other, trying to keep her finger pressing up against the trigger of the flamethrower as light as she can, enough to make Abe believe that carnage will be unleashed without a second thought.

Halfway through her trek to who knows where, Annabellina pauses, standing stock still.

" _What is it?_ " Abe hisses to her, crouching low.

" _I don't know..._ " Annabellina cranes her head further. There is the sound of someone shouting, a hardy, feminine voice burdened with strength, maybe even light agony. After that, the woman's voice is followed by something most definitely inhuman, the way the timbre of the voice shakes with a strength that makes all the hair on her arms stand on edge. " _Something not human..._ "

" _Let's look. I want to destroy something. You want to destroy something. Fire and blood, Annabellina. Fire and blood..._ "

Annabellina tightens her grip on the handle of the flamethrower, and runs in the direction of the noise. Breaking through the vicinity, past a few buildings, and ducking underneath a few trees, she skids to a stop in the plaza that houses the obelisk. She's seen the obelisk once or twice in her walking around the arena, but she's never physically come across it. However, she does not have even a second to glance at it before her attention is taken to elsewhere, as when she turns her head slightly to the left, she lets out a gasp of surprise.

Abe, inside her head, collapses to his knees, as well.

The Careers - Milor, and Valencia, rather - are dancing around a ten foot tall metallic, sentient trash can. The mutt slashes a clawed hand out at Valencia, who races forward, ducking underneath the mutt's legs, stabbing upwards. It seems to do nothing, as the mutt simply takes a step forward, nearly crushing the Career underneath the right foot. Milor unleashes a scream, running at the mutt, sidestepping another grab, before chopping at the hand. His sword seems to only bounce off of the metal, and rather, a clanging noise reverberates around the plaza, wrenching Milor back and onto the ground.

The mutt turns, as if no damage had been done. It brings a hand into its chest, bringing out a sphere of trash, rather the size of the dresser back in Annabellina's room, and it looks for someone else not attacking it. Its gaze lines up directly with Carrion, who is hiding behind a building, trying to keep calm, trying to keep off of his bad leg. The mutt chucks the sphere of trash at Carrion, who yelps in terror, dashing as quick as he can to the right, the projectile missing him by a hair, hitting one of the walls on a different building, the wall crumbling underneath the impact of the force. Whatever bits of the brick are still standing seem to dissolve before Annabellina's eyes, eroded away by battery acid, goop splattering off in bright, puke green globules.

Milor runs over to Carrion's side, giving him his arm to hang onto. Valencia makes another run at the mutt, its gaze passing back and forth between her and the guys, all the while forgetting Annabellina over on the opposite side, now facing the mutt to its right. Her grip on the flamethrower tightens, and the canister in the backs builds up some. Valencia leaps at the monster, hitting it one of the legs, but like Milor's own slash, it simply reflects off, and instead, the sword flies out of Valencia's grip, it spiraling into the air, the hilt hitting her in the cheek. She fumbles for her weapon, now on her hands and knees.

"Weapons can't do anything to it..." Annabellina whispers, watching as the mutt turns to face Valencia, snarling its jagged teeth at her, its halcyon eyes staring into her. Milor and Carrion are screaming at their companion, begging for her to move, begging for Valencia to get up and run.

"We should kill them all," Abe comments, fire in his voice, his arms building strength.

Annabellina shakes her head. She can't watch them die. She can't. She doesn't think she can physically go through with watching anyone else die, not as she stands on the outskirts and watches, not when she can _do_ something. "No..." she whispers again, setting her head back.

"No?" Abe repeats. He laughs, a hearty one, a choked one, one full of spittle and grimness. "No? What authority do you think you have? You belong to me, Annabellina. You will kill them all. Fire and blood!"

 _Inside her head, she stands, cloaked in ivory, in the white dress that her father picked out for her on reaping day. Annabellina stares down Abe, and for once, she gets a good look at him. Her counterpart, her personality that has always dominated the circles in the back of her mind where the other personalities hailed from. Anna, Lina, Belle, and Ellie never went to his corner of the world, never went there lest there be conflict._

 _Abe, always the source of their conflict. Always the source of her conflict. Something goes awry because of him, and he snaps, the other four cower in their own fear, until all that is left is Abe, and Abe believes he can rule them all, that he can bend anyone to his will, because violence is the answer. She stares at him, at the worst parts of her, the part that makes her father not want to talk to her after he tucks his darling into bed and kisses her on the head good night._

 _His face is scarred, white flesh now tainted as black as the mutt's arms, and his face is cut up, as if someone had taken a razor's edge and drew a map all over his face. His skin isn't scorched everywhere, but most places are not clean, nor are they beautiful to look at. It is the pale bits, such as tiny spot underneath the left nostril, that make his appearance more haggard, as if the rest is simply makeup. These cuts are constantly bleeding, droplets of blood spilling down cheeks and onto the imaginary linoleum floor, scorched, scorned, destroyed, and all of it villainous._

 _"You are mine, Annabellina. There is no more Annabellina Circuit in you any more," he snarls. "I've killed that side of you. There is only Abe!"_

 _Annabellina takes a step forward, and Abe likewise, for he is her, and she is him, and coexistence happens in this sector of her brain. However, before Abe can even speak, she seizes him by the throat, pushing him away from her so where he cannot reach her. Annabellina's body seems to aglow in a harsh, white light, like that of an exploding star, a supernova of power, as she lifts Abe off of the ground, he kicking out pitifully with his legs, trying to hurt her. How the mighty fall, how those who are really unable to fight pale in the face of travesty._

 _She tightens her grip, the white glow overwhelming her body._

 _"I belong to no one's authority," she declares, through clenched teeth. "I am not yours, I am my own. I answer to myself, Abe!"_

 _He dissolves in her grip into a pillar of salt, consumed by her halo of harsh light._

Something in Annabellina explodes. A freedom she's never known before, starting in the back of her head, almost like the beginning of a tumor, but it warms her entire skull, that warmth flowing through her body, and all the way down into the soles of her feet.

"I am Annabellina Circuit!" she screams, and then, she races towards the mutt.

Valencia squeezes her eyes shut, flinching inwardly, awaiting for the slash to consume her, as Annabellina runs, racing past Milor and Carrion, no doubt scaring them out of their wits. She dives in front of the Career, pressing her finger up and into the trigger of the flamethrower. A jet streams out towards the mutt, a bit of it catching on fire, and the mutt screeches in pain, stumbling back.

She turns towards Valencia, who had shielded her eyes away from the fire, and the Career looks at her as if she's seen a ghost. "Annabellina?"

"Go!" the girl from Five shouts, turning back to the mutt. "Run! Get out of here!"

She doesn't look to see if Valencia actually leaves, but she is certain that she does, taking off with Milor, running as best as they can alongside Carrion, away. Annabellina advances on the mutt, igniting another stream of fire, dousing one of the mutt's legs. It makes an inhumane howl, backing up some, slashing outwards, but weakened further by its body falling apart. The mutt stumbles back further, as Annabellina continues to advance.

Giving a quick glance at the flamethrower gauge to her left, Annabellina's heart falls. There isn't much left in the canister, and perhaps there hadn't even been that much in the flamethrower in the first place. Unless she does something drastic, the mutt is not going to be out of commission, and there's nothing Annabellina or any of the Careers can do to stop it if that happens, as steel weapons do nothing but bounce off of the mutt's exterior.

Annabellina is out of options.

A tear, a lone, solidary tear slides down her face. Abe may have kept her in shackles, and he may have tormented her for years while the other personalities did their best to stem the attacks, but there is nothing they can do now, and Abe is incapable of keeping her in chains any longer, and that means he is incapable of stopping her now. Her father will understand, for the smart man he is, for the intelligent daughter he helped give life to. Her district will understand. Her few friends, those that have stuck with her, they'll understand to.

The mutt, recovered now, the fire burning away a few bits of the exterior, but not damaging it near enough, roars at her again. Annabellina removes the flamethrower pack off of her back, holding it straight in her hands, eying the beast with a murderous glare. If she does not stop the mutt here and now, there won't be a victor to the Hunger Games should she fail. This monstrosity will simply destroy everyone, and Annabellina is not going to let that happen.

It is as if she is viewing the events from outside her body, from a different perspective than her own.

She digs her feet into the concrete, feeling the Earth underneath the soles of her shoes. Annabellina screams, charging at the mutt. She's got one shot, and she has to make it count. The mutt screams back at her too, taking a massive step forward. With all of her might, Annabellina chucks the flamethrower at the metallic trash can, caught up in the roar of her own blood in her body, adrenaline coursing through her veins.

" _I love you, Dad..._ " she thinks to herself, and Annabellina gives herself credit that she isn't sobbing, that there's zero tears coming from her today.

Her trajectory is correct, Annabellina having calculated the equation and the throw as quick as she could while Valencia scrambles to safety. The canister holding the flammable liquid, which is spilling outwards of the nozzle as she throws it, collides straight into the mutt's own hands, which were extended towards Annabellina in a slashing motion.

The mutt's hands enclose around the canister, and for a split second, the world stands still, time stands still, and all the hair on her arms rises upwards. Her ears pop, Annabellina continues screaming, and she runs into the mutt as fast as she can.

The canister of flammable liquid explodes in the mutt's grasp, incinerating it, a fireball roaring from the depths.

Annabellina sees the tips of white, of her exploding star, of her supernova, racing towards her, the blizzard tips leeching out.

She sees the white, feels the white.

And after that, nothing.

* * *

 **8th: Annabellina Circuit, District 5 Female, 16. Killed by a Capitol Mutt. Created by goldie031. I am once again, crying, as I wrote this death, because I knew this is where her story would end up. How tragic she had become, with killing Lowelle, with ending Persephone, and how I think a majority of you loved in her a grotesque sort of way, because who knew what terror she would actually unleash. Beyond that, in the end of her arc, Annabellina managed to break free from the shackles that Abe had over her, somehow able to keep her at bay, and in the end, she, being the sweet and kind, and brave tribute she had been designed as from Goldie, she sacrificed herself to ensure others could live, and that is a death fitting of her. Thank you Annabellina, you've been wonderful.**

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by Santiago poncini20_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon_ ] / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

District 11: **Caiden Grove** [ _Submitted by LongingForRomeo_ ]

District 12: **Colt Sheppard** [ _Submitted by Mellissa rose_ ]

* * *

 **Final seven, ladies and gentlemen, we are at the final seven, can you believe it? That was Chapter #37: A Gaze Through the Trees, and with a heavy heart, we say goodbye to Annabellina Circuit, a tribute I believed I could have taken to the end, but writer destiny it had not be so. We didn't see any of Caiden, or District 7 this chapter, but do not worry, there'll be plenty more later on. Having the number get down to the wire like this really made me realize, that fifteen chapters ago, at #22, back in February, it now being June, all 24 of these tributes were alive, all of those beautiful characters, and here we are. District 7 is now, as with Persephone gone, the only tribute with both still remaining, but that can change, right? Who do you think, with the cast we have now, what our victor will look like?**

 **The top five is soon to be upon us, and remember, that is Chapter #41. Please, even though we are not there yet, get your vote in to make this easy, or otherwise I will have RNG decide that vote. After this chapter, there are only four more arena chapters to be had, which means we're also extremely close to the wire for that one, which is at Chapter #45, so we are truly almost there, ladies and gents.**

 **For a brief second, think back to Bonnie's conversation with Calhoun in two separate chapters of the Capitol storyline, and a conversation she has with Rennie early on, and then connect that to the mutt we saw that killed Edwin, and this mutt that had attacked Caiden, and in which attacked the Careers in this chapter. Any connections or anything you guys can think of?**

 **Beyond that, next chapter, #38: Innocence of the Lambs, is the next step in our Capitol storyline, where we tighten the threads and bring everything closer together, and you most certainly do not want to miss it, as your mind will be unable to take it all in. Please review, you guys, it absolutely makes my day whenever I am able to wake up reviews from my submitters and from my readers. Thank you all so much for stopping by, I'll see you all soon again with Chapter #38: Innocence of the Lambs. You guys have an amazing day! Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	38. Innocence of the Lamb (Capitol Plot X)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #38: Innocence of the Lambs. Last time, in the arena, we had a lot of things going on, mainly where the Careers awoke a sentient, mutt trash can that tried to kill them, Colt has plummeted down to the deep end, and Annabellina broke away from the chains that Abe held onto which kept her trapped, she sacrificing herself to destroy the mutt that would've wiped out all of the Careers. In the Capitol chapter prior, Hector has been let in on some plans, Bonnie has come into a saddening realization, and Hale has seen the worst levels of betrayal. This will be another Capitol chapter storyline, and then we're back to the arena - be praying for that Top 5 spot, ladies and gentlemen - and I hope you all have your dramatic glasses on. Enjoy Chapter #38: Innocence of the Lambs.**

* * *

 ** _The One Who Loses His Ability To Speak_**

* * *

He hears her clamoring down the hall before her voice even reaches the fringes of his office door. It is the sound of her heels slamming onto the tile with such ferocity, it makes him believe that there is a gigantic bear running down the hall instead. Though he knows she'll never do anything to hurt him, not in the way Lewlyn used to, his heart still beats in his chest at the speed of a coyote's run. One of her hands grips the edge of his open door like a claw, with talons extending out to slash his face.

The angered face of Bonnie Rodney shoots out behind his open door, a satanic expression behind an angelic wall of white, a movement so sudden that he jumps back in his chair slightly. "Rennie Davis!" the first lady screams his name again, as she had been calling it and saying it as loud as she could ever since he first heard her footsteps.

She comes into the room, slamming his door shut, and Rennie scrambles to catch the cup of pens that begins to tip over due to the shockwave of the slammed door. Bonnie's blonde hair is long and down today, as she's usually had it in a short bob over the last few days, and Rennie appreciates the change, as it allows for the shadows to fall on her neck and illuminate her beauty in a stronger way.

With the trash can mutt dying yesterday due to Annabellina's interference, Rennie has had zero work to do on the Mutt Creation team, essentially leaving Bonnie jobless as well, except she normally likes to strut around in the Gamemaker Center and tick off Lewlyn whenever she can, strutting around in the platinum spray painted high heels instead of learning how to run her country. He had been given a rather miniature office in the back corner of the building, a good five to ten minute walk depending on hallway congestion, from one end to the other. Ever since he drops the red clothing, which has now been a full week, into a dirty heap on his bedroom floor - the clothes are probably covered in ants or some other repulsive thing from the bug kingdom by now - Rennie is elevated upwards from an Avox role, and actually given an actual position that gives him a door and a manila plaque with his name written on it.

The swell of pride in his chest when Lewlyn orders a few workers to drill it into the door is a moment he'll never forget, watching as a piece, albeit small, is given back to him. The fame he used to have, of the melodies that he'd create with a few back-and-forth motions of his hand, gripping the violin ever so gently. Now, whenever he looks at his violin, all he sees is the copper remnants, the remnants from years ago, years he can't get back; the melodious noises he used to experience, the melodious noises he used to hear... they're now just cat scratches on a brick wall, accompanied by Bonnie screaming his name.

"Rennie!" she shouts again, and he lapses out of his thought, jumping once more, his knee hitting the desk. The container of pens tumble onto the floor, and for a split second, the president's wife's eyes follow said trajectory, and in that moment in time, Rennie gets a glimpse of her wrath, a wrath he'd never expect to see, a wrath he'd never want to be on the blunt end of ever again.

He's been practicing the sign language book that Lewlyn had given him, she trying to converse with her brother on the regular in said form rather than speaking. She, as Head Gamemaker, sent out a memo to every Capitol official who'd have even the slightest interaction with him in their life to try out the language practice, instead of forcing her brother to type out his sentences on the pad.

It seems the memo never reached Bonnie's desk.

He signs the word for 'what', at which his boss furrows her eyebrows together, and one eye stays directly focused on the pencil container on the ground.

"What on Earth are you doing?" she shakes her head in confusion.

Rennie lowers his hands, a lump forming in his throat. For how much Bonnie seems to claim to care for him, she sure as hell doesn't show it anymore. Not like she used to, at the very least. She cannot even be bothered to try, and that is what cuts him up the most, he thinks, but he doesn't truthfully know anymore at this point. She isn't the same woman he fell in love with years ago, and she hasn't been for a very long time.

He unlatches one of the desk drawers in which he keeps the tablet, fingers flying away. Rennie has to look onto the bright side of things, at the very least. His mutilation and subsequent slavery, which is something he is coming to terms with using as the label, with using the table to talk to others, has made him a very good typist. If anyone ever needs a secretary to type out emails and notices and memos and what have you, Rennie Davis is the guy.

 _It's Panemian sign language. For those who aren't Avoxes and cannot speak, which is what being mute is, you learn this language to communicate._

Bonnie raises an eyebrow, crossing her arms. "How come I've never heard of it?"

 _You don't hang out with the mute crowd, I'm assuming, Bonnie._ He appreciates a bit of her naivety, but Rennie doesn't clutch his pearls to his chest like he used to, like how Lewlyn still sort of does. His sister and the first lady have a lot in common, despite both never wanting to be in the same room together, and their naivety is going to get them both killed.

She locks her jaw. "Fair point."

 _Lewlyn gave me a book on how to sign. Now, if someone wants to speak to me without it taking forever, I can just do this._

A chill runs up and down his arms, and Rennie can bet all the other appendages that are still his own that it is when the name of his sister slides out of his mouth that she goes on the warpath. Bonnie's face darkens immeasurably, and she clenches her hand into a fist, a sneer distorting her features. "Lewlyn, your sister..." she mutters. "The whore who constantly is finding ways to tether you to her since she loved your cock so much!" Bonnie howls.

That has gone too far, and now it is personal.

Rennie's blood screams to volcanic temperatures, and his entire body heats up. It is in no way, shape or form Bonnie Rodney's place to call his sister any of those names or say any of those accusations. He wants to scream, he wants to douse her in coffee and oil and light a match and laugh as her skin gets set ablaze, but Rennie stills his hand, and lets Bonnie squeeze her eyes shut so she can compose herself.

 _That's not fair to say,_ is the only response Rennie can think of, but as soon as she opens her eyes again, he hits the backspace button on the tablet to erase the message. He does not need to add more fuel to the fire than what he has already caused. The vengeful trio of his sister, his first lady, and his one night stand are already catastrophic enough to burn down the entire Capitol and the rest of Panem as it is.

Bonnie pinches the bridge of her nose, shaking her head. "I didn't come by to insult your sister," he hears her mutter, and she continues to shake her head, clearing away the debris and the gunk that clouds her judgement. She looks back at him, and he realizes that she's holding a folder in her right hand, which he hadn't even noticed when she walks in, focused directly on how her hands turn into fists at the drop of a hat. "I came here for you," Bonnie says, and her tone is not warm, there isn't the slightest hint of motherly intentions vibrating in the syllables that she speaks. "You committed treason."

Rennie's eyes widen. Treason is not a word that simply gets thrown around like a common phrase. Not from Bonnie Rodney's own mouth, either. He staggers back, grabbing the tablet, holding it to his chest like a protective shield, typing out as quick as he can. _What do you mean?_

"This!" Bonnie exclaims, throwing the folder down onto his desk, wrenching it open.

He doesn't need to lean over to read what it says, as Rennie can see the two pictures poking out given their appearance on the page as it is; his mouth goes dry, and his elbows firm up. _What is that?_

"Evidence," she runs a hand through her hair. "Just like I had mentioned to my husband and Lewlyn, with you being the only other person who knew this common fact, there were two mutts in the arena. The butterfly in the botanical garden that killed Edwin by slicing his throat open with its proboscis, and the trash can that chased Caiden around, got awoken by the Careers yesterday, and very same one which Annabellina destroyed with her flamethrower canister," Bonnie leans into the file. "Two mutts, one lethal, one non-lethal. Calhoun and Lewlyn are the only other two people who knew this information," she tilts her head to the side, like a cat, but again, there's zero empathy or curiosity in this motion. Simply coldness, and he feels that freezing stare lance directly through his heart. "The butterfly that killed Edwin was the lethal mutation. Should someone have stepped into the botanical garden and wanted to leave, the butterfly was honed to kill the target. Edwin destroyed it in his final moments, meaning our lethal mutt died. The trash can we created wasn't lethal," her eyes alighted a dangerous diamond, as if there was a miniature sun hidden behind her iris and blocked out by her pupil. "Please, tell me, Rennie, how one of our mutts we created all of a sudden becomes lethal and dangerous when its code had never been designed that way?"

Rennie is glad that he no longer has a tongue, otherwise he would've bitten it by now, he'd have torn it clear off and bled onto the pristine white tile everywhere. He glances outside his window for a brief second, to stare at the rose bush. Part of him desires to run over and break through the glass, seize a rose, and stab Bonnie in the gut with it. It'd turn him into a tribute, one of the seven left fighting for their life, and then Rennie could battle Peacekeepers to the death if he wanted to.

It was a desire, nothing more.

He cares for Bonnie too much to do that.

 _I don't know. You tell me. You're the one accusing me of something... you have the audacity to do such a thing._

Bonnie has the audacity to tilt her head back and laugh. "Audacity? No one else, Rennie, had the access to these mutts except for you and I. I didn't even know that the mutt chased Caiden in the arena two days ago when it did until yesterday after I saw a highlight reel, as I had been with Pollux that night. So, two days ago, at least, someone twisted the mutation code to turn it into a weapon, and it wouldn't have been me. It was you."

 _You're dead wrong, Bonnie._

She sneers at him again. "You're all mad at me for not sucking your dick, aren't you? Pollux bowed down to you and worshiped you, and since I'm not doing that, you want to get back at my hard work by tainting it. You've always lusted after me, you were never good at hiding it. What would my husband say? The Avox who has already committed treason once for forging documents, then tries to kiss the first lady, and now tampers with a Hunger Games... I can see Calhoun ripping the flesh off of your back."

Another urge to scream comes out of Rennie's mouth, but instead it is steam pouring out of his ears. _Me? I lusted after you? You know I didn't forge any fucking document! You cornered me in the main room last week and tried to kiss me, and I stopped you. How dare you!_

Bonnie shook her head again, clucking her tongue. "Who'd believe you, Rennie? The loved Capitol princess, who is pregnant with the president's child, or an Avox who couldn't stop his sister from screwing him?" she walked up to him, resting a hand on his shoulder, and Rennie's skin bristles with electricity. Even now, with how repulsed he is by her, and with what she is saying, he is drawn to her like bees to honeycomb, and he wants to lick it all up before taking the largest bite out of it, which would drain the forbidden queen of all the liquidous life that allows her to rule. "It'd be easier if you just told me the truth, and I won't have you charged with treason. I won't tell another soul of this. You tampered and tried to rig the Games because you were upset with me not accepting your advances."

Rennie knows that can't be true. It just- it can't. He seizes the tablet, typing a thousand miles a minute. _It couldn't be me._

"And how is that?"

 _I have an alibi. I was at my sister's room that entire evening after work ended learning the sign language book she had given me._

"If I don't believe that, no one will. You do understand me, right?" Bonnie frowns, her eyes dismally sad.

Rennie recalls what it had been like pressing his fingers up against his throat and squeezing as hard as he did, just to get murderous and treasonous Pollux off of his back, at the way his eyes expanded, and how the tent in his pants rose higher and higher until it hurt to strain himself. Just what it would feel like right now if Rennie were to press his hands up against Bonnie's throat? What would that freedom give him? He could take her now, do the unspeakable action that all men have over women... and he _wants it,_ he lusts for it more than he lusts for her.

Instead, Rennie frowns, shrugging his shoulders. _I used to think you were the most wonderful woman in the world, yet in the matter of a week, you've singularly destroyed this side of you. My opinion of you has changed._

"How so?" Bonnie licks her lips, shaking the long locks of her blonde hair.

 _You're a monster. And I can't get enough of it, but I want zero part of you._

The first lady raises her eyebrows, picking up the folder with the pictures of the mutts. "I give you until the interview with the victor of this year's Games to come crawling back to me, Rennie. After that... you're on your own," she makes another step towards the door, pausing, just like when she had come in, with one hand gripping the edge of the door frame with her talon-like claws. "I'd watch your back, if I were you, Rennie. I know that there are many people in this Capitol who think you're just so innocent, that you're this sweet little lamb, but know this," she narrows her eyes. "I see right through you, for the cunning son of a bitch you are, and next time you think to double cross me like this, I'll make sure Calhoun takes more than just your tongue."

The sound of her heels clicking and clacking on the hallway tile resume, and Rennie stands in the corner of his office frozen.

A few seconds later, the puke appears, the vomit comes out, and he's too late to do anything about it.

 _What has he done?_

* * *

 ** _Kevia Janelle: Victor of the 84th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

Of all the ways she expects her breakfast to end, Kevia Janelle of the District 1 is able to confidently say that she did not expect it to end with Hale Cornerstone's elbow jutting into her neck, she slammed up against a brick wall outside of the Viewing Center. None of the Peacekeepers donning their white outfits do anything to help, and a few of the victors that are still here walking to and from only give an odd glance or two towards the ladies, and resume their business as if nothing has happened.

Hale's eyes blaze and burn, one hand crooked and digging into her skin as the elbow is currently at mid-throat, and the other raised into a fist, more than likely aimed at her head, and Kevia does not want to take any more pills to help her sleep. She doesn't need sleeping aids if a concussion is going to do it to her. One minute she is throwing away her polystyrene cup filled with orange juice, the next it is slapped out of her hand - which splatters all over her new designed outfit by the District 1 stylist team - and Kevia wrestles briefly with some unknown assailant, eyes falling onto Hale's enraged body, and the victor from One goes lax for a split second, enough for the other victor to get the upper hand.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Hale screams at her, and if looks could kill, Kevia would be an incinerated pile of bones at this point.

"What are you talking about?" Kevia barely chokes out of her system, trying to push Hale off of her, but it hardly seems to move her an inch. She needs to back into the gym if she cannot push weak Hale Cornerstone off of her, or otherwise it means she is really out of practice.

Hale digs into her pocket, ripping out a typed sheet of paper, and Kevia steals a glance over at it, unable to really read any of the writing. "This! You were going to throw Arizona and I under the bus!"

Kevia's heart sinks, looking at the typed letter that in the other victor's hands is the same one that she had created and had been thinking of sending to Bonnie. The fact that a married relationship between two victors not of the same district existed through Hale and Arizona's bond, and Kevia was about to send her fellow victors up the river. She didn't want to create it, honest to god, as she had been backed into a corner and didn't see a way out of it.

"I- I wasn't, I really wasn't..." Kevia babbles out. She's wanted this, she's wanted the spotlight, she's wanted the love... she's wanted what she's never been able to have, and then comes waltzing in onto the ballroom floor is Hale Cornerstone, beautiful in every way, attracting the man that she's had her eye on, and now the two get to live happily ever after in a world where they don't follow the rules, despite everyone else doing the same thing.

"No?" Hale releases some of the pressure on Kevia's neck, giving her a bit of breathing room. "No? Then what would this look like, then, huh? You trying to blackmail me for something? You were going to rat Ari and I out to Bonnie, for some selfish, disgusting reason, I bet."

"I didn't have a choice!" the victor pleads.

She hopes no one else is paying attention to the scene. Whenever Kevia tries to look away, at anything other than Hale, truthfully, the other victor grips her face and forces her to look directly into the stare of the devil herself. Satan is a woman, whether Kevia wants to believe it or not. Flashbacks to when she had been younger, the idealistic Career in the arena, and much more naïve, Kevia's blood turns to ice. She's on her knees, begging for her district partner not to leave the alliance so the others don't hunt him down in the middle of the night. She grips that boy's hand so hard Kevia nearly rips it off when he moves away, a stunning eighteen year-old with blonde hair that covers his dark eyes in a way that makes her body ache, but ultimately she is unsuccessful, and four days later, a Career alliance of her and District 2 stab her old partner in the chest with a trident at different directions, since when he left, he took a gigantic amount of their food with him.

She is here now, getting to her knees, begging for forgiveness, begging for freedom like some dog, and Hale Cornerstone holds the power?

Kevia wants it, wants what this meek girl from District 2 is somehow able to hold onto.

"Didn't have a choice?" Hale mocks her. "How did you even know about he and I in the first place?"

"It's not like you hid it from everyone very well!"

All Kevia can think about, as she screams at her fellow victor, is how Hale could've even found out. Her mind immediately hones in on Lance, the bastard. Not every victor that is alive knows about her and Arizona, but Kevia is pretty sure a sizeable chunk do, and are all simply put at the appeasement of her or Arizona, in some way shape or form. Blackmail, if she wants to go so far. She knows that they have children, but beyond that, nothing.

"So you don't deny it?" Hale eyes the other female victor. "You don't deny trying to throw me under the bus? That you were going to send me up the river in a box?"

Kevia shakes her head back and forth. "I was cornered, Hale. Bonnie wanted information, or otherwise I was to be punished-"

"Punished?" the victor from District 2 interrupts. "For what?"

"I- I stole her grandmother's necklace and she found out through some pictures. She was going to tell Calhoun about it, and she wouldn't if I told her something treasonous instead. I still haven't told her a thing, I swear it, I swear it, I swear it!" Kevia is grappling at Hale's wrist, skidding out on the tile floor, squeaking noises coming from the soles of her shoes as Kevia is unable to get a firm footing on anything. Hale's sneer of disgust is what stabs Kevia through the heart the most, as even though Kevia knows she can't stand the girl for the life of her, they had a connection, and Kevia had been ready to sell it in a heartbeat. "I was even thinking about tearing up the letter..."

Hale takes a step back, closing her eyes, and exhales deeply. She extends her head to the ceiling, all the while Kevia curls up into herself on the floor, wanting to burst into tears. If Lance, Bonnie, or her father could see her now... "To think I thought we might have been somewhat friends..." Hale scoffs, shaking her head, a smile dancing on her lips, but not one of the normal ones, not one that may have had happiness in it at some point. "I know we certainly didn't get along, like when we had lunch, but this whole time you were going to stab me in the back..." Hale bites on the inside of her cheek. "You think all of us victors, for going through the same horrific experience of winning the Hunger Games would all want to stick together and be there for each other, but instead, we're all rivals trying to stay in the presidential favor..."

She tears the letter into a million tiny pieces, letting them rain down onto Kevia's head, the paper mixing in with the tears that are starting to flow down her cheeks. A cavernous hole appears in her chest, whenever Kevia tries to breathe, she's unable to fully push that breath of power out of her, and she chokes on air again. "I'm sorry..." she sobs. "I'm so sorry..."

"You aren't sorry. If you were, you would've never even written the letter to begin with."

"What- what can I do to have you forgive me?" Kevia babbles, looking up at hale through her muddled stare, as images begin to blur together and she's unable to see what Hale looks like, glowering down at her.

Hale crouches down to Kevia's level, balancing on one leg, resting her arm across it. She places a warm hand up against Kevia's face. "You can die, Kevia. If I ever think you're going to do this to me again, I'll kill you the same way you killed your district partner," she digs a few fingers into the soft flesh, and the other victor's body crawls in terror. "You can go and die. That is how I'll forgive you," she stands back up. "My family and I are off limits. I never, _ever,_ want to speak to you again..."

Not even as much as giving Kevia a kick, or another glance in her direction, Hale walks back into the Viewing Center with the other remaining victors, all the while Kevia pawns at the floor, picking up the shredded pieces of paper that could've caused the doom of a woman she envies so much. Hale Cornerstone, with her perfect _fucking_ husband, with her perfect _fucking_ kids, and her perfect _fucking_ life that she never had to work for.

Kevia's heart won't stop beating, and she knows that sooner or later she'll have to projectile vomit into a trash can at some point.

What is she going to tell Bonnie now? What secret could she possibly find out in the next few days before Bonnie marches her down to the executioner's block?

The road to hell is paved with good intentions... and Kevia has just found the snake in sheep's clothing, the innocent lamb that had truthfully not been that innocent.

Another hour ticks, and the pressure of the Capitol draws ever so near.

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, it is certainly good to be back. I did not expect to enjoy this chapter as much as I did - especially Rennie and Bonnie's banter, as both of these scenes were ones in my initial plot creation I didn't intend to have, but I feel like including them has made this experience so much better - but here we are, with Chapter #38: Innocence of the Lambs, who it turns out, might not be so innocent.**

 **Did Rennie actually do something to the mutt data as a way to get back to Bonnie and her scheming? They seem to be at odds, but she's a craving he clearly cannot get enough of... and ooh boy I want to spoil so much for ya'll, but I just can't. I like characters in which Kevia is one of those, who talks the talk but cannot walk the walk, for I know how much of you - which would literally be two people out of all the reviewers who actually read these chapters lol - like Hale's character, she just had to lay down the law; she and Arizona and her children are not bargaining tools or chips to play poker with. She doesn't roll like that.**

 **I have every chapter update planned out as to when I want them done, as there are thirteen chapters left to write, and both plots are super close to coming to a close. Remember, the final five chapter is going to be #41, so if you do not have a top three pick for whom your tribute, should they be alive at that point, are voting for, please get that into me via PM. I would absolutely love a review you guys, where you think may the story is heading, how's the writing and characters and plot, and whatever else you want, as you guys reviewing makes my day.**

 **I will see you all next Friday - oh so hopefully - with Chapter #39: Five Hundred Degrees Fahrenheit, which will be another arena chapter, Day 7, where we are ironically, on Day 7, down to the final seven tributes left alive, and clearly nobody's safe. Chapter #40 will also once again be resuming the Capitol storyline, but obviously we'll reach that when we get there. I hope you guys have an amazing day! I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	39. Degrees Fahrenheit (Day 7)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #39: Five Hundred Degrees Fahrenheit, the seventh day of our Hunger Games arena Quarter Quell, and we are down to the final seven... ooh excitement awaits! On the last arena day, Colt has dived down into the deep end, Milor revealed a bit of his true colors, the Careers managed to awake a mutt in the arena that nearly killed them all, and Annabellina sacrificed herself for the greater good after breaking free of one of her personalities that had her under their grasp... and thus the final seven was born (Valencia, Peri, Linden, Milor, Carrion, Colt, and Caiden), who are all winners in my eyes, but only one can** ** _be_** **the winner, and that will heavily depend on you guys come the voting, which is in a few chapters. Hope ya'll enjoy Chapter #39: Five Hundred Degrees Fahrenheit.**

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

Self-sacrifice.

Valencia Shale has been tossing that word back and forth in her head for the last twenty-four hours, ever since witnessing in objectified horror as Annabellina Circuit screams at the most terrifying thing she's ever seen, before being engulfed in scarlet fire, as if it came from the gaping mouth of Hell itself. A shiver laces through her body seeing the girl from Five's face shine in the sky, a starlit quality that destroys her left and right, how such a beautiful face could have been terrorized by such demons without most people knowing. She had seen glimpses. A fading, dying star... snuffed out by a black hole, a lone piece of driftwood all alone in the middle of an ocean where the waves are like glass shards.

The irony of Annabellina's death is almost humorous, that Valencia can nearly taste it in the back of her mouth like cotton candy that has gone sour. Her daffodil, her beautiful and ethereal Persephone just two days ago is incinerated by the same machine that causes Annabellina's demise, as the girl full and well knew what had been about to happen when she charges the mutt. That Circuit girl could never reach the levels of her Persephone, not matched in beauty, not matched in anything else. Yet somehow that deranged psychopath managed to make it farther than her gemstone, her little princess of the Underworld.

Valencia feels as if a knife has entered her gut, and some invisible force is twisting it around, while this force is laughing, their head tilted back, and the only reason she knows that this entity is here is because there is a copper river streaming out of all of these open pores, but she cannot discern which pore may go to which orifice.

She looks over at her allies, Milor and Carrion exhausted out in the shade, they having just sparred gently, since Carrion's life force seems to be slowing at a rate that is beyond alarming, and Valencia's mouth goes dry whenever she looks at him. It's little things that may have gone unnoticed with someone else, but not Valencia. His face is a lighter shade than normal, or his speech is a tad bit slower than expected. He drinks way more water than the rest, and his gait has gotten larger and larger to the point where she and Milor need to slow their speed down to allow Carrion to keep up. The one thing that has not changed is his physical prowess, as that remains strong as ever when he chucks a spear clear down one of the midways.

The girl isn't a doctor, far from it, but she can tell that Carrion's life is drawing close to the end and the only way he can be saved is if he wins in the next few days - that means she'll more than likely die, and Valencia Shale likes Carrion Bastion enough to probably call him a friend, but not enough to toss her sword aside and let the fires from above consume her - or otherwise the next cannon will be for him as the gangrene reaches his heart, or the blood loss becomes too much and he cracks his skull open on the concrete. _Or_ she runs through him with her own sword, but she isn't going to do that to him, that'd be betrayal, and Valencia Shale does not betray allies as long as they still _are_ allies.

Valencia grabs her bag and her weapon, sitting down next to he and Milor in the shade, she wiping her brow which is glistening with sweat. It is starting to get a bit warmer each day, but nowhere near as hot as it felt on the morning of the Cornucopia, as all twenty-four tributes rose from their plates. Another chill laces through her, thinking about it now, how there used to be just so many of them, but like lights being snuffed out in a storm, one by one the others drop like flies, the ones blindsided by the searcher light, or those exhumed from the Earth, uprooted and brought to their graves in the sky.

She catches the brunt end of one of Milor's sentences.

"For as long as I live, I'll still be angry about it," he finishes.

"Angry about what?" Valencia asks.

Milor turns to her, lips pursed, and his face flushes somewhat. Valencia's skin begins to itch, whenever he looks at her, but she's not so sure as to why. She knows that he knows what is happening to Carrion, and that means more than likely that the pressure is being drawn closer and closer, she is becoming more and more dangerous to his survivability, and with them being the two highest scoring tributes left alive, as Carrion is two rungs below Milor for some odd reason - once again, Valencia has zero answers for this - that the ultimate showdown has to between her and Milor.

If Milor does not know that his boyfriend is hanging onto the precipice of the living by a mere thread, than perhaps he is a bigger idiot than she gives him credit for, as Milor walks around the arena with his shoulders set back, smiling with that perfect face tan of his and that cream colored complexion, with the dark hair... sometimes when she thinks about how absurdly perfect Milor Drusus is, it makes her want to vomit.

"Not killing Annabellina like I wanted to," Milor says, and he looks away for a moment, clenching a fist. This is not the first time he's complained about it, moreso he's on the fifth or sixth repetition of this same mantra, to the point where Carrion - oh bless him - is even rolling his eyes.

Valencia sighs deeply, rubbing her brow. This is what being a leader has meant, from listening to Kevia's instructions over and over in her head until she hears them in her sleep, where she cannot run away from the instruction. To sit and listen to the gripping of your compatriots. "Milor, she's gone, and there's nothing you can do about it. Persephone is dead, Annabellina's dead, and you aren't. We've been over this."

"Doesn't mean I have to like it," he glares at her, a look of anger that she hasn't seen all that often. Her blood turns to ice, and Carrion reaches out to place a hand on his shoulder.

"I'm not saying you have to like it-" Valencia starts to interrupt him, because _dammit,_ she wants to throw her two cents in without him getting his damn pants in a wad. Her mouth feels as if she is speaking with a metal spoon placed on her tongue, where the syllables rut together somewhat, and it is starting to annoy her. This is stupid.

"I wish I could resurrect Annabellina just to split her in two..." Milor hisses.

"You don't mean that," Carrion says softly, rubbing his boyfriend on the shoulder.

"You don't know what I want," and Milor snaps, shrugging his shoulder, moving Carrion off of him. "And don't presume to think you do!"

Even in his weaker state over the last few days, the decay eventually starting to set in, it does not change the fact that Carrion furrows his eyebrows together in petulant anger, this time gripping Milor's shoulder so his fingers can dig into the other male's clavicle. Valencia's breath hitches in her throat, and she's glad she brought her sword, her left hand reflexively moving over to the hilt, encircling the metal gently so it can rest coolly on her fingers.

"Don't speak to me in that manner, Milor. We're just trying to calm you down."

"Would you prefer to be dead?" Valencia asks, point blank. Milor blinks in confusion for a few seconds, then looking over at her, shaking his head. "Like it or not, Annabellina jumped in front of the mutt yesterday and sacrificed herself to destroy it. I wasn't doing anything to it with my sword, and eventually we would've tired out with that thing chasing us. She saved our lives... and I will not forget that." A lump forms in her throat, at the way the flesh falls off, and how, despite her best efforts, Annabellina is screaming in her last moments, her final few painful moments.

Milor shakes his head, still not understanding the slightest implication of what Valencia is trying to get at. "How can you say that, Valencia? Yeah, I'd really rather not be dead, sure, but Annabellina killed my district partner, killed _your girlfriend,_ and managed to escape, just so she could have some heroic moment and you're going to forgive her!"

"I'm not forgiving anyone, I'm just-" Valencia starts, and then she stops in mid-sentence, words dissipating on her lips like the smoke of a blown out candle. Carrion's eyes are the size of saucers, fliting back and forth between his boyfriend and his leader of the alliance currently kept together by a bandage. Girlfriend? Valencia cannot believe it. They weren't- Persephone never had been... Valencia didn't consider- _what?_ She furrows her eyebrows together. "Persephone wasn't my girlfriend."

"Then what was she? Ya'll kissed. Ya'll hugged. She cried in your arms. You cried in hers. I don't know what you always did," and for some reason, Milor sounds way beyond pissed off.

"We just cared for each other. There's nothing wrong with that!"

"There isn't," Milor agrees, and Valencia goes lax with the grip of her sword. "But, I can't sit here and let you just desecrate Persephone's name. Not when she meant that much to you."

"She never would've been anything like you and Carrion to me, Milor," Valencia licks her lips. "I'm not-" and she comes to another sudden stop, her own eyes widening, her body seeming to heat up to five hundred degrees Fahrenheit, despite sitting in the shade.

The Career from District 2 raises an eyebrow, lifting his chin, and Carrion has gone entirely silent. "Not like what, Valencia? What aren't you like?"

"I-"

"What aren't you not like?"

"I'm not you," she finishes. "I'm not gay."

Milor shakes his head, almost laughing nervously. There's a gentle and slight breeze blowing through the vicinity of their camp, but Valencia's skin is that of a volcano, as if she had been devoured by one of Annabellina's fiery blasts. "Forget this. I'm not going to argue with you, Valencia. Keep thinking whatever the _fuck_ you want to think, because clearly, you don't care about us like I thought you did. You're just another selfish District One asshole. Carrion should've let Marcus kill you too."

Carrion and Valencia both open their mouths to interrupt, to maybe even smack Milor upside the head, but before Valencia can get another word in edge-wise - maybe a ' _how dare you'_ or an _'excuse me_ ' - she's interrupted by the boom of a cannon.

* * *

 ** _Caiden Grove: District 11 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

The last couple of days have been relatively easy, in all honesty, and Caiden is as calm and collected as a cucumber. He hates cucumbers. Whilst being chased by a mutation in the arena, not knowing where he is going can be something that has dampened the mood a bit, Caiden has been by himself for the entirety of the games thus far, and the last person he had seen had been poor Marina where his own sword entered her back.

Also, to be the cherry on top, he's in the final seven, something a District 11 male tribute hadn't done in quite awhile, and now he's here, and now he's closer to victory than ever before, where he can almost taste it, like a fragrance riding the air. Three Careers stand in his way, District 7, and some twat named Colt. Caiden knows that he will never best the Careers in a head-on struggle, since they're the best of the best. District 7 is a bit different since he knows less about them than he does about his third cousin twice removed from the family, but there is one thing for certain he knows about, and that is poor Colt Sheppard. Some little lamb left out all alone in the pen for the wolves to tear at, where alliance members are ripped away from him like candy in a baby's grasp, and now he's the single tree standing on a shoreline as a tsunami comes in to take all that he holds dear.

Caiden wipes some sweat from his brow, mashing one of his fingers into his palm, adjusting the sword in its sheath at his waist. Lifting the finger that had been mashed into his palm, he presses his finger against one of the wooden posts, making an X shape on the middle of the post. His mentor had sent him a clay pot full of paint, and then several instructional pieces of paper after that given the look of confusion plastered on his face. Paint? In the final seven? Can he not have been sent _anything_ more useful?

He is currently standing underneath one of the rollercoaster's wooden support beam structures, surrounded by a maze of posts and leaves and wasp nests that he stays away from, because there is no way those could be just any sort of wasp, and he's not taking any chances. Caiden has lost his way around once or twice, but when looking at his map, he's standing in a spot underneath the ride, and to the very end of the ride's picture on the map, to the left of it, is some sort of gray area, unmarked and left blank with a question mark. That is where he must go, that is where he predicts the finale to be, with whomever might _be_ in the finale, and he's not letting that chance slip out of his fingers.

That is when it dawns on him, with what his mentor has given him. This maze might be the only way to the unmarked area, and getting lost is not an option. Caiden has been marking every post he comes across with a blue X to signal his way back to safety, in case he ever needs to flee. Should any tributes come said way, they'll be lured straight into the jaws of the leviathan... Caiden's skin cackles with electricity, and static makes all the hair on his arms stand on edge.

Who needs poison?

Practicality is where it is at.

Caiden places his sword down against one of the posts, not having heard a single sound for hours other than the crunching of his feet on the soft ground. Given the way two of the posts are angled, he cannot face the post with his sword attached to his waist, and he's willing to give himself a moment's peace without exerting himself. With seven in the game still, people will only be brought together should the Gamemakers want to bring them together.

He dips his finger into the aquamarine paint, dashing another blueberry denoted X, when he turns his head up, to look underneath the rollercoaster track. Caiden has no idea how long this piece must have existed for, how long this place must have existed for, as the rot is slowly starting to tear the framework apart, wooden board by wooden board, and he thinks it could collapse at any minute, just like Colt's alliance, and he will not be caught dead underneath such a waiting catastrophe.

The sun shines through the canopy of wood, pocketing in pillars of sunlight, halcyon columns where the dust and ash and smoke dance with one another under a high beam's gaze. Caiden screws the paint cap back onto the clay pot, as he has been at this for over an hour now, and he wants to rest. Even geniuses - remember, he is _not insane_ \- need rest, they cannot keep going and going and going and going; not even Caiden Grove.

Caiden hooks the pot onto his belt loop, and turns around to reach for his sword.

He stops dead, mouth going impossibly dry, and when he swallows, it is like a coarse rock sliding down his throat.

"Colt..." he says gravely, blood turning to ice.

The District 12 male tribute looks a bit worse for wear, and that is Caiden putting it nicely. Colt's eyes are dark, almost bequeathed with lust, and he looks like he hasn't slept for days on end, as his face seems to sag. A couple cuts seem to line his exposed arms, as he's taken off the shirt that came from the Capitol, his chest revealed to the cameras, skin smoky and lustrous, as the pillars of light from above clash with the opaque surfaces.

It takes Caiden a moment to notice that Colt is now also carrying his sword, alongside some wooden spear that the boy suddenly drops, kicking it away from him, it resting up against a post, outlined in that damned blue paint. He is trying to figure out, coming out to all the dead ends, how the boy just suddenly came upon him, and how Caiden didn't even hear it.

"Colt..." he tries again, taking a brave step forward - some would call it foolish, but Caiden Grove isn't foolish nor insane; he's a genius, remember? - and outstretching one of his hands. "Listen to me, buddy, you don't know what you're doing. Drop the sword. Someone could get hurt."

A few seconds pass, as the faulty wiring in the other tribute's head seems to take a second to catch up, but Colt's facial expressions are ahead of the game. He scowls, furrowing his eyebrows together, matching Caiden step-for-step, raising the sword. "Buddy?" he hisses. " _Buddy?_ We're not buddies, Caiden. You- you took _everything_ from me..." his voice rises and fails, like a dying whimper, or even a siren's wail.

Caiden raises his hands up again. This isn't good, this _isn't_ good. "Hey, listen here, I- I don't know what you're talking about, I-"

"You killed her!" Colt screams, waving the sword around haphazardly. "You killed Gaia! You killed Marina! Because of that you killed Marissa! You killed Rochelle! You murdered Alexandra! You killed every single one of my allies!"

"I didn't kill Gaia... nor Marissa, nor Rochelle..." he shakes his head back and forth vehemently. Caiden looks over at the wooden spear lying on the ground. He's still in control of the situation, he is still in the right head space to make sane decisions, while Colt is losing his mind and looking worse for wear. Is this what Marina felt in her last moments? Is this the terror that everyone on the brink of death discusses, when the Grim Reaper is knocking at your door? Caiden's heart beating in his chest nearly drowns out all the other sound.

"It was your trick that took Alexandra out..." Colt is close to the verge of tears, his eyes bloodshot, his skin glistening with sweat, and he can practically feel the heat vibrating off of the District 12 male, as if his internal body temperature had been five hundred degrees Fahrenheit. "You _poisoned_ her with your stupid apples and your stupid bullshit! You took her from me! You took her from me!"

Caiden's back hits one of the wooden beams, probably smearing blue all over his shirt, but he could care less about that right now. This is going to be a now or never moment, and he does not have much time to think. He goes for the wooden spear, and he'll send it directly into Colt's exposed gut. The shock and pain will force him to drop the sword, and then a nice and quick beheading will be all Caiden needs to finish the poor sap who thought he could compete with titans.

Colt continues rambling about something, but Caiden has lost the urge to listen. He dives for the wooden spear, left hand grabbing it and turning around to thrust it forward, when his entire being screams in pain, and there's a flash of red. Caiden's entire being unleashes a wail of fury and agony, and he falls back onto his elbows, backing away as best he can with one hand up against another wooden beam.

One minute, the pointer, middle, and ring finger on his left hand is there, and the next, gone. Caiden's eyes prickle with red hot tears, and he is trying to still sound confident, he needs to sound confident... he's a mastermind, he's a genius, and he _is not going to die to this buffoon!_ Caiden looks at the gap on his left hand, the three fingers serrated unevenly at different joints, spewing copper profusely onto the dirt.

The other tribute advances on him, still screaming. "You deserve this! You deserve all of this pain and more!"

"Please..." Caiden whimpers. "Please... please don't do this..."

He can see, on the horizon, the glory that is destined for him. Caiden can see it clear as day, all the men in their white uniforms collapsing to the ground, hands trying to claw off the leather that surrounds their neck as they begin to choke, puking up emerald globules that sizzle onto the sidewalk. Caiden can see the entire infrastructure of District 11's menacing population begin to fall, where they free themselves from the chains of oppression. That is his role, that is his destiny, to lead the downtrodden against the strong, to overthrow the Capitol, and Colt is _messing all of it up!_

Caiden clutches the wounded hand to his chest, trying hard to not notice the severed fingers just hanging there, tears falling onto the sidewalk.

Colt smiles, but that is not Colt Sheppard smiling. It is ethereal, it is beautiful, but it isn't _him._ "I thought about doing this more times than I can count," he picks up the wooden spear as well, tucking it underneath his arm. "Alexandra promised me, actually, that I'd get my revenge. I promised her that she'd get hers too," another menacing step. "This is for her and I. Goodbye, Caiden."

"No, I... please-" Caiden begs, throwing out another hand, the other uninjured one, if he could just crawl to his destiny to save the downtrodden, if he could just-

The tribute from District 12 slashes the wooden spear across the viper's neck, so he couldn't speak anymore lies, and then, using the same man's sword, runs it through him clean down the chest, pinning him to the post.

The satanic serpent has been silenced, ushered by the echoing boom of a cannon.

* * *

 ** _Peri Florence: District 7 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

The silence used to be peaceful, a tranquility that had been upmost welcoming. Now, however, it became a sign of eeriness. A sign of oppression. A sign that things are drawing to an end, where Peri's breaths are shaky as she inhales, seeing the white wispy form of oxygen being sucked into her body. Linden lies on his back, hands outstretched and combating with the flowers in the aromatic breeze, looking up at the sky. They haven't really spoken all that much today, and electric sparks flow across her arms in a current.

The arena is shifting, down to the final seven, and that means her time with Linden Hazel is going to be coming to an end; she can taste it too, like butter that has turned sour, while she spreads it over a piece of toast. She wonders what her mother and father are doing right now, in preparation for the end to come. To witness the possible end of their daughter. Peri doesn't really care anymore about them, they've abandoned her, truth be told, instead giving her the pity that she has always hated, and now they're watching their little baby girl not even hesitate to throw axes onto innocent bystanders.

Her parents, when the time seemed to be winding down, disappeared into the shadows, meshing in with the wall so their hands make up the blotchy splotches of white paint that decorate the banisters, or their voices simply warp into one together, repeating ' _I'm_ _sorry_ ' over and over again until Peri wants to rip her own ears off of her face. The last few weeks before reaping day are her lying in bed, her own throat seeming to want to collapse in on itself, surrounded by the bread baskets and the fruit stands and the fresh linen sheets. Peri does not understand the idea of gifting people close to the drink of death with items they'll never use.

Someday her luck would run out, her breath would give way, and all the uneaten food simply sitting on her bookcase, making elongated shadows across the floor at night in the pools of moonlight, would rot away, like the fading flower Peri Florence is, until the skin would sag off of her bones, and the cancer cells would eat at the other living flesh like locusts swarming a plant. Peri is too weak to sometimes even lift herself off of the sheets and reach over for the items, and her parents are too absent to even help her, and there's no other siblings in her family to keep her company.

Her entire last leg of her life, until Peri begins to feel renewed by volunteering for the Games, is spent by herself, sometimes sobbing, sometimes screaming at herself for the sobbing due to how she hates the pity, and feeling her body eat itself alive. It is on the day of the reaping when her parents arrive upstairs, her mother being a rather well known seamstress in the district, with a brand new, lacey white dress for her, for her little faded flower, and hands it to Peri, the cloth almost translucent. Peri looks her mother dead in the eyes, tears prickling at the corners of them, these tears fiery hot from Venus's core. The dress is beautiful, one of the most beautiful things she's ever seen.

"You're dressing me like a ghost for her funeral," she says, voice raspy, and her parents burst into tears.

Peri is to be dolled up like a ghost walking alongside her coffin, fluttering in the breeze like a leaf holding on to a branch with all of its might, but no one expects her, and frankly she doesn't expect to do this herself, to volunteer and safe some little girl's life so she can end her own. Now, with the strength serum coursing through her veins, Peri finds it even weirder now, looking at the frail body that is her own, feeling the ribs jut through the tribute outfit, knowing that deep down something is killing her, yet she has the strength of a Spartan athlete.

Linden gets up from his spot as he had been tired of lying down on the ground, looking up at the clouds, and reaches for his axe, resting a bit away from him. He stands for this, to actually move a bit more into the shade on the side of the hill that they're on, that they've been on for the last three days in peace and quiet, not having run into a single other person, and again, it has gotten to the point of bothersome for Peri.

She cannot help but whistle, admiring the boy's lithe and appealing form through his outfit. Dirt cakes his face, and makes Linden look even, well... hotter.

He pauses, frowning, eyes darting towards her. "Can you stop doing that?" he asks.

"Stop doing what?" Peri repeats back to him.

"Hitting on me. It- it makes me feel uncomfortable."

"Oh," is all she has to say back. _Oh._ Peri had no idea, and it bothers her that she didn't even consider that fact. "I'm sorry. I'll- I'll stop."

Linden doesn't say anything else, instead sitting underneath a large oak tree sprouting on top of the hill. At this height, from this distance, Peri can see the entire arena in all of its glory, which is rather beautiful when lit up, but that is not what is on her mind. If she wants to complement Linden's appearance and call him gorgeous, she should be able to. Now, this painted whore from District 7 with the least amount of honor in her system has screwed that all up, raping her district partner, and he succumbing to the woes of the world.

It burns her, for a reason Peri is unable to pinpoint exactly, and all her anger does is motivate her to do more.

She has always found him adorable, given his somewhat smaller stature, his lustrous auburn hair dancing with the oak leaves, and the toothy grin that is jagged like a rock formation. Sometimes she'll even go as far as to call him handsome, and beyond that, captivating, especially after he's sparred against a dummy or exercised, when he takes off his shirt, revealing the gentle, but definitely there, muscular form in his abdomen and beginning to sprout up in his chest. As he breathes, with the rising and falling of his shoulders, Peri sometimes moves herself a bit to hide the wantonness her body begins to show, as if the temperature of the arena rose to five hundred degrees Fahrenheit.

Peri locks her jaw, tilting her head to the side.

Screw it.

She's taking matters into her own hands.

Peri stands up, making sure to take her weapon with her, walking over to Linden's spot in the shade. It's been two days since he revealed the tragic truth, something that he had been hinting at occasionally over the course of their friendship, and she has spent the last two-hundred-and-sixteen hours of her life getting to know her district partner, a lot has slipped out between the two of them. How they both miss the way the sun would fall through the trees when dawn would hit District 7's skies, or how the faint smell of hickory and maple syrup would greet them on their morning walk to school. How they couldn't forgive some of the Peacekeeper brutality going on, and how they're too weak and small to stop it. Most importantly now, something that has been sitting on her mind ever since Persephone's passing, and no time like the present to get it out.

The girl stands a bit back, out of the shade, but not making any sudden movements to startle him.

Linden opens his eyes, raising a hand to block out the sun.

"What?" he asks, tone not irritated or annoyed, just nonchalant.

"I was wanting to ask you something," she starts, her mouth dry, and Peri tugs at the collar of the arena outfit. "Ever since the Top 9, I-"

"Just ask me. You babbling won't help," Linden interrupts. Okay... maybe a bit annoyed.

"Besides the prostitute, are you still a virgin?" Peri blurts out, and then she immediately wishes she hadn't. Oh shit. Her words escape her thoughts, a bit too fast before she is able to reel them in, and now they're a bucking bronco with no one to hold onto the reins.

Linden's eyebrows furrow together, and he stands up, stepping out of the shade, but this time, he takes his axe blade with him. He matches her evenly, and she tries her best not to 'size' him up, since they're equals here, in their discourse. "Why do you want to know that?"

"I'm just curious."

Another eyebrow raise, but Linden shakes his head and sighs. "Yes. Yes, I- it was the only time. How about you?"

"I'm a virgin…"

"Why did you want to know?"

A passing moment of silence washes over them, nothing more than the breeze and the thousands upon millions of eyes across Panem watching this conversation take place. Peri has spent the last few months of her life boarded up in a room with no one of substance coming to visit her, saying and pleading for false promises from some man above in the clouds, not returning on their bullshit statements as is, and she's sick of it. The thoughts and prayers won't heal her. The thoughts and prayers won't get her to winning the Hunger Games.

 _But he can._

Peri does not know what sort of otherworldly blessing has fallen upon her in this moment, when she sits down next to fourteen year-old, timid and possibly feral Linden Hazel on the train ride to the Capitol, and he wouldn't stop looking at her, looking at her to the point of irritability, but only does he not see her scars as flaws, he sees the beauty in them, bringing her to tears that weren't of her own volition in a time for who knows how long. Screw needing someone to bring her up. She's brought herself up, and with his help only. Without him, she doesn't think she could do it on her own.

Peri licks her lips. Now or never.

"Because I wanted to know what this would feel like before I die..."

She connects her mouth to his, silencing his speech with a kiss. Linden's words, whatever those would have been, die to the force of her pressing herself to him, and she pushes back against him, Linden walking backwards until they rut into the tree. The stature problem is a bit different, but Peri is way out of her element, and so is he. She does not know where to put her hands, instead placing one to rustle with his hair. He cups her face, the other hand resting square against her sternum, between her breasts. He tastes of smoked ham and salt, and she can only imagine what the smell of leukemia brings to the forefront.

Peri pulls apart first, exhaling, a line of saliva trailing from her lips to his, Linden's eyes cloudy. Her heart roars in her chest, like a lion that cannot be silenced.

Her next action is something that she has little control over, it just _feels_ right. She grabs onto the hems of the training outfit, beginning to tug it over her head. Linden's hands grab at her own for a second, and she stops.

"Don't..." he whispers, but Linden's face is an expression that is the complete opposite.

Peri shakes her head. She's been living in a life where men have told her what she can and cannot do, and she's moved on past that point. "I want to show you. Please. I _want_ this."

The girl continues going all the way, lifting the rest of her outfit, exposing herself completely to Linden. Peri had removed her bra from her body days ago, it lying somewhere in a trash can, since it had gotten too hot outside for her to keep it on. Peri lets her hands fall to the side, she still having her pants on. Naked from the waist up, and Linden presses himself further into the tree. She is skinny, skinnier than some starving kids she has seen clumped in the alleyways, where she can count her ribs and rub her fingers over the mold that sticks out, where she can pour water down into the crevices in between. Her chest sags, her body limp, but it _is her._

Linden opens his mouth to say something, but she can read it on his face.

"Don't say it," she interrupts, a lump forming in her throat. "Don't apologize. Don't say sorry. This is who I am, and I am owning it."

He looks as if he has been struck by lightning, eyes glassy. "I- I was going to say that you're one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen, but if you want me to apologize, I can do that too."

Peri takes another step to him, placing a hand against his chest, lowering him down onto the ground. "Do you want to go further?" she asks, hesitating for a bit. She thought about kissing him before, she thought about even taking off her clothes and exposing herself. Beyond that, Peri's train of thought has ended since there is no more track.

"Do you want to go further? I'm not doing something if you don't want to." Linden repeats the question right back at her.

"I do," and it does not require another second thought.

She kisses him again, this time a bit more lightly, before lifting his own shirt off of his head, revealing his lightly toned chest. His face is the color of his hair, cheeks a twinge of embarrassed pink, but Peri cannot believe she's doing this right now, as if someone else is in control of her actions, and she is a mere puppet dangling onto lax and cut strings.

"Do- do you know what you're doing?" Linden asks, stopping her again, placing a hand on her shoulder. His chest rises and falls, muscles outlined in a glistening sheen of sweat.

Peri shakes her head vehemently. She has no damn idea what she's doing. The girl did not expect to even be alive two weeks ago, and now she's on top of her district partner in the physical representation of hell.

"No, I don't," she exhales. "I've never done this before and I'm terrified. Do you know what you're doing?"

"I've never been a good actor."

"Well than that makes it simple then..." Peri's voice trails off.

"I suppose it does," Linden smiles, and then presses his lips up against hers this time, in another kiss.

Peri forgets what time it is, she forgets what day it is, hell, she forgets where she is.

All she can think about is Linden Hazel.

And the ninety five things he can do with his tongue.

* * *

 ** _Colt Sheppard: District 12 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

 _Colt Sheppard is on trial._

 _His hands are shackled to the bench in front of him, where he cannot move a muscle no matter how hard he tries. Vultures circle him, those above in the clouds, and those standing on the ground. He has stopped sobbing hours ago, where now all that comes out is the words of a broken man, unintelligible signs of loss of focus, loss of control, and a loss of sanity._

 _Alexandra Quinn, his firefly, his reason for living in the arena, sits atop the judge's seat, acting as judge, jury, and executioner, holding a gavel made of bones in her left hand. Caiden's bones. Her bones. The bones of every person he's ever encountered. Circling him like vultures are his allies and enemies, Marissa, Rochelle, Gaia, Caiden, all staring, all hissing at him, all screaming. His mother is in the pack somewhere, watching behind a fan, watching behind a white veil to shroud her from the death._

 _The once alive girl from District 11 slams her gavel onto the bench in front of Colt. "Mr. Sheppard, do you deny the charges brought henceforth?"_

 _"No! I don't! I'm guilty, I'm guilty, I'm guilty!" the tribute cries out, trying to wrench his arms free._

 _Rochelle clamors towards him, gripping him underneath the jaw, forcing him to look her in the eyes. Her face is caked with blood, and sharp, jagged lines fall down her shoulders. "Do you deny pushing me away? Do you deny thinking I had the strength to survive? Do you deny giving up on me?"_

 _"I don't deny it! I don't deny it!" Colt screams at her, but his screams are animal wails, unintelligible sounds to the onlookers who share no mercy, not one ounce of forgiveness in their hateful stares._

 _The courtroom is exposed sheetrock, sitting underneath a starry night sky, where the constellations form his name in the interstellar pathways, each twinkling spatial body exploding with the power of a supernova every time he opens his mouth, the cores above falling to the Earth to land atop him, burning his flesh, making him wail in agony._

 _Marissa is next, and she slides up to his left, pressing a hand against the side of his cheek, before licking up the skin. Her tongue is scaly and black, and where her chest would be is a gaping pit, as Colt can turn his head to look through her body. She makes her way around to him, but no matter how hard Colt tries to look away, she's there, forcing him to stare at her, forcing him to heed all attention at him._

 _"Do you deny stirring the pot? Do you deny threatening to kill me? Do you deny failing to show your prowess as leader?" Marissa hisses._

 _"I am guilty of it! I'm guilty of what you accuse of me!" Colt yells at her, trying to rip the shackles off. He had this sort of strength when he killed Caiden, and the strength has left him. Tattered curtains hang on the walls, banners with his face on them ripped to pieces, slashed down the middle. Alexandra bangs on her gavel, and another supernova falls to Earth as a meteor, a splash of blood hitting the back of his throat._

 _Caiden has followed suit, and when he slams his hands down onto the bench in front of Colt, both of his hands are gone, instead just fleshy stumps with rot exposed, pouring out cardinal rivers of life onto the bench, which floods into the stand, beginning to soak up his clothes. Colt cannot believe his eyes; he just killed him! How's he alive? How did he survive the stabbing? How did he survive? How?_

 _"Do you deny murdering me? Do you deny wanting to get revenge for your own selfish reasons?" the once alive male from Eleven asks, tilting his head back and forth, swaying side to side like a snake, eyes glowing the colors of the rainbow._

 _"Forgive me, oh please forgive me!" Colt cries out, but these pleas fall on unheard ears._

 _He has not the stomach to look at his next victim when she exposes herself. Gaia Whisp in the flesh, with her head dangling off to one side, sliced from the throat, a nail stuck a bit above her left ear, but that is all he sees before he squeezes his eyes shut. Gaia grabs the sides of his face, trying to force his eyes open, but Colt leaves them squeezed shut, having the strength and power for that at least._

 _Gaia screeches in anger, slashing a talon down his cheek, causing flesh to be torn away, but there is no more sound in Colt's throat for him to even cry in pain. His district partner, oh how his district partner is lost and alone without him. "Do you deny leaving me to die? Do you deny watching me lose my head and break my ankle without a second thought to save me? Do you deny wanting me to die?"_

 _"I don't deny it! I needed you dead so I could come home!" Colt is sobbing at this point, but he might as well be crying towards a brick wall._

 _He can feel her presence flee away from him, and he opens his eyes, trying to keep standing upright. His head is killing him, pounding over and over again. Alexandra hops down from the judge's seat, gavel still in hand, walking with it and slapping it onto her palm. A constant THWACK noise every few seconds, and the louder and louder it gets. She crouches down next to him at eye level, gently running a hand through his hair, and Colt melts._

 _She breathes lightly into his ear, sensually running the hand down the side of his face, and Alexandra places a thumb up against his lips, which are cracked and bleeding, running over them with her finger._

 _"Do you deny lusting after me? Do you deny wanting to have your way with me? Do you deny, Colt Sheppard, having me in the alliance just to get off?"_

 _He cries the hardest for her. Rochelle, Marissa, Caiden, Gaia... none of them are his Alexandra Quinn, none of them are his firefly, his little sparrow that takes off in flight against the winds of a firestorm._

 _"I am guilty..." he hangs his head with shame._

 _"Sad. So much potential," Alexandra clucks her tongue in disgust. She shakes her head. "I had so much hope for you. Well, it has been decided, Colt Sheppard, the male from District 12, that you are guilty of all charges brought before you. I hereby sentence you to die."_

 _Alexandra raises the gavel and bashes it into his head, the boy blacking out._

...

 _SNAP_

Colt jerks out of his hiding spot, slumping over against the tree, cradling his head. The voices won't top. He cannot stop seeing their faces, seeing all of their dead faces. Someone's approaching, off in the distance, via the snapping of someone's feet against the leaves that rest on the ground, the dryness on the ground that could cause a forest fire.

"I think I see someone..." comes a feminine voice behind the tree line. _Valencia Shale._

"Is that who I think it is?" follows another voice, this time masculine. _Carrion Bastion._

Colt continues to rock back and forth, hands over his ears, trying to block out the noise, but all he is doing is blocking out the noise from the outside, not the ones trapped in his head, clamoring at the white walls to get out, to get out, _to get out._ His arms are an unrecognizable mess, he trying to scrape off Caiden's blood that splatters all up and down his arms, now torn to bits by lion claws, and he's bleeding out, he's losing it, but Colt is still alive.

"Oh shit..." is another male voice. _Milor Drusus._ "That's Colt Sheppard. The District 12 guy."

The sounds of their footsteps get closer, before they all cease, Valencia drawing in a breath. "Blood..." she whispers.

"Do you think it's his? He- he could be the cannon we heard earlier," Carrion says.

Milor swallows heavily, getting the closest to him, before recoiling sharply. " _Fuck!_ Look at his arms!"

Audible gasps can be heard, but Colt has no idea from which direction they are coming towards him at. "I- I think I'm going to be sick..." Valencia exhales, gasping again. "Do- do you think he immolated himself?"

He whimpers audibly, curling up in on himself, rocking back and forth. The footsteps approach even more. Louder and louder, crunching the dry leaves underneath their feet. Carrion, once more. "Guys, I think he's not all there. Just- just look at him."

"I can't watch this," comes Valencia, and the sound of her shifting in place. "This isn't my territory. I can't bring myself to do it."

"We need to take him out of his misery," Milor muses, but it sounds like he is trying his hardest to not lose his lunch either. "He's dying, guys. Just look at how much blood he's lost. We shouldn't let him suffer."

"I can't do this, then," the girl decides.

"Just look at him, Milor. He's- he's broken."

"I'll take care of it," Milor says, voice full of pride. "Just head back, I'll catch up."

"Are you sure, Milor?" Valencia asks.

"It's what I do, Val. I take care of the broken things."

More footsteps approach, and Colt twitches at the noise, but he cannot bring himself to look. Alexandra's voice rings in his head, but this time, unlike when he is being sentenced, she is sitting in front of him, offering him her hand, with a gaping wide hole in her throat, fresh blood still dripping in the cavern left behind. Colt cannot see his mother, but he can feel the disappointment sitting on his skin, the way her voice can be heard in the arena's forest, riding alongside the rollercoaster rails.

"Colt, look at me, buddy..." the Career's gentle voice can be heard over the dim beating of his heart.

 _Buddy._ Hah, the irony. Colt recalls Caiden Grove saying the same thing to him once upon a time, whether that had been hours ago, days ago, eons ago, centuries and centuries ago... Colt has lost count. He looks up at Milor, who is blocking out the sun underneath the emerald expanse of trees, since Colt wanders out of the maze, he wanders out of the rollercoaster hellhole and looks for a place to escape.

His entire body is hot, as if his internal temperature had been raised to five hundred degrees Fahrenheit. Colt is unsure whether or not he is looking at tears in the other tribute's eyes, but Colt Sheppard stares back at his own reflection, a reflection raising a sword and swinging it down. This Colt Sheppard isn't a disappointment; he's a victor of the 100th Hunger Games.

Milor Drusus makes sure the boy's death is quick, clean, and painless.

One second, Colt Sheppard has life in his lungs, breathing.

The next, he does not.

* * *

 **7th: Caiden Grove, District 11 Male, 18. Killed by Colt Sheppard. Created by LongingForRomeo. Man, the places I took this character to. I have to say, Caiden is one of those characters when I had been given that I earned to have, since he seemed to instill a challenge instead of being another tribute bemoaned by stereotypes. Many of the points in his arc, in his character... they were ones that hadn't originally been part of the design, but likewise with every tribute in this SYOT, they've evolved into something more, something spectacular. Although I am sure no one is going to be sad that he is gone, I think there will be a presence left vacant now that he is gone. He was rather universally disliked, but I think loved at the same time in a special way. Romeo, I hope Caiden was all you asked for and more; I will miss my District 11 poison - remember, _not insane_ \- genius. **

**6th: Colt Sheppard, District 12 Male, 18. Killed by Milor Drusus. Created by Mellissa rose. I have to say, right now, Colt's last POV, his nightmare trial section, might have been one of the hardest things to write in my entire life, and I have written some dark material. He had been one of the very first tributes to ever be introduced and his character had been so wholesome, so in touch with reality, and then the arena got to him. The arena trapped him and ensnared him and stole everything he cared about. I knew he wouldn't be a victor, despite having wonderful material to work with, I never saw him being a contender in the end, but his journey has been something to read and to witness, I can tell you that. I think of all the character deaths I have written so far, his has impacted the most. Brutal, you guys. Colt... thank you for existing.**

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ]

District 4: **Carrion Bastion** [ _Submitted by Santiago poncini20_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon_ ] / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #39: Five Hundred Degrees Fahrenheit. We are now down to our final five, our three Career tributes of Valencia Shale, Milor Drusus, and Carrion Bastion alongside District 7 going strong of Peri Florence and Linden Hazel. We have sadly said goodbye to two beautiful and wonderful tributes in Caiden Grove and Colt Sheppard, those who came so close, but couldn't make it to the finish line. I didn't expect to have this written so damn early as I did, since it took me only two days to write the entire chapter, and I wanted to end the month of June on a high note.**

 **Out of all the districts in the arena, would you have expected District 7 to be the only one remaining with two tributes left alive? Can you believe that three Careers have made it to the Top Five? Can you believe it that Peri and Linden - something highly requested - may be the true pairing of them all! (Eat your heart out Carrion and Milor!) Can you even believe we are _at_ the Top Five? When I asked you guys what your Top Five predictions were a few ways back, if you were to compare them, what would they look like now, in all curiosity? This chapter was difficult to write, but we're here, and the end is near.**

 **Ladies and gentlemen, we are in the Top Five, and like I said, the Top Five will be whittled down to a vote-off to create our Top Four, and how this vote goes, will dramatically shape the ending of the story, because at this point, I have made my decision of who I think my victor will be, and of course, a back-up choice in case said character is eliminated via the vote-off, but that is in your hands, ladies and gentlemen who can vote. Remember, please send those votes into me via PM, as I am aiming for that update, Chapter #41, somewhere around July 16th, but more than likely we'll be there days earlier.**

 **As I wipe the tears away from this chapter, I hope you all do review; I love having this sort of dialogue about my work, which wouldn't be here without you all as it is. This was Day #7, Chapter #39: Five Hundred Degrees Fahrenheit, where we have arrived at the Top 5. Chapter #40: Beautifications of the Wicked will be one of the longest Capitol OC storyline chapters yet, and when we return to the arena in Chapter #41: Vengeance in Our Veins, a vote-off will commence. I love you all so much! Thanks for all you do! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	40. Wicked Beauty (Capitol Plot XI)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #40: Beautifications of the Wicked, another continuation of our OC Capitol storyline, which I am so psyched for! For the month of July, I have five chapter updates planned, but I am going to see if I can push to update a few more times than usual, think the January or February speed, which was pretty quick. There are eleven chapters left, this one included, so the end times are almost,** ** _almost_** **upon us, ladies and gents. The chapters will become a bit smaller, so only the arena chapters and the couple of finale ones will extend past the 8k barrier I believe - stick it to me, folks - and I am so excited. Here we go with Chapter #40: Beautifications of the Wicked.**

* * *

 ** _Arizona Merviere: Victor of the 88th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

Sometimes his brother can be too _damn_ serious, and it sucks the fun out of everything. All Arizona wants is his coffee in the cute little coffee shop just outside of the Viewing Center, but he has to be followed. He has to be scared out of his damn mind when trying to add the creamer and the sugar - he is not one of those "black coffee" drinkers, they're just depressed people who hate themselves, that is what Arizona believes. Why would anyone want to drink a bitter drink unless that meant life or death? If he's starving and dehydrated out in the middle of the woods, perhaps the victor could make an exception... but not when the delicacies of the first class are sitting on his table.

Arizona sits down, scooting his chair back, hailing over the waiter. Hale has been relatively distant the last couple of days, truthfully ever since she spoke to Lance, which is the last time he's gotten to speak with her, as she says something cryptic about blood not running that deep, before scurrying away to the second floor, the day before Persephone burns to a crisp. It is the final five today, and Arizona can almost taste victory on his lips, that sort of victory is unbelievable to him, but neither of his tributes are alive to even experience said victory.

His cup of coffee comes, for a simple buck fifty, and he thinks it is a swell deal, since Arizona has a bit more money than what he knows what to do with, never being the most opulent individual to come from the circle of victors - all one needs to do is look at Kevia's cashmere sweaters and how she turned her Victor's Village house into some kingpin residence - and with he and Hector living in separate houses, having separate lives, it is _his_ own money, not a shared balance.

Arizona rips open a sugar packet, opens two French vanilla cremes, and grabs a spoon to stir it all together. He knows the liquid is going to be beyond hot, and his taste buds are currently cursing at him, since they know what cruel fate will be happening to them shortly, but he doesn't care. With it being the final five, the tributes have no idea that a vote is happening for tonight, whether there be five tributes alive, or any fewer than that; some tribute is being voted out of the arena and will be killed.

"Do you have any idea how hard it is to find you in this stupid city?" Hector's voice suddenly shouts behind him, scaring Arizona half to death.

He stumbles forward slightly, in his seat, spilling coffee all over his pants, burning his skin. He hisses his pain, cussing under his breath, his older brother appearing into view around him at the other seat opposite his, one hand resting on it. Arizona grabs a napkin from the dispenser, wiping at the spill. That's going to stain... _shit,_ these pants were expensive.

"Good morning to you too," Arizona mutters. "You just made me burn myself."

"You don't wait for the coffee to cool before drinking it?" Hector asks, frowning, pulling the seat back, it screeching loudly on the linoleum floor. The little shop that the victors find themselves at is a rather seemingly hole in the wall, decked out all in noir colors, black and white all over, where the tiles alternate like a chessboard, the tables are a bit chromatic, but he thinks they may just be spray painted, and since the décor is so hideous, it's cheap. Arizona likes the cheap factor the most.

He looks at his brother sardonically. "What do you think?"

"You do the weirdest things," Hector shakes his head.

"And here I was thinking my day would be somewhat normal," Arizona shrugs his shoulders, finishing up the cleaning of the coffee spill. He wads the napkin into his left hand, holding onto it in case he needs ammo towards his idiotic brother. He knows that he - Arizona is referring to himself - has always been the less intelligent of the Merviere siblings, where his brother has come from a background of science and theology and intelligence, Arizona is reckless, headstrong, charismatic, and uncalculated in all of his manners. He frowns, however, when looking over at his brother, who is packed more than usual for a trip to the local coffee shop. He knows that they've been in the Capitol a bit too long for a typical victor team who had their tributes eliminated awhile back, but Hector is loaded with two suitcases, a hat on his head, and dressed like he'll be away for the day. "Why do you have your suitcases?"

"I'm leaving," his brother answers.

Arizona frowns. "Leaving?"

"Yes," Hector nods, and then pauses, biting on his lower lip. The trademark sign that what comes next no one is going to like. "And I think you should too. We should head home together."

"Why?"

Arizona knows why. If he prolongs the conversation long enough, Hector will give up; he's given up way too many times for it to be normal now, and that bothers him slightly, that his brother, who has murdered people to save his skin, has always surrendered to the stronger wills above him without much of a fight, when twenty plus years ago, he's desperately clawing his way out of his makeshift prison cell.

"Our stay has been long enough," Hector says. "We can come back when Bonnie gives birth to their son, but we need to go home. We need to go back home to District 10, Ari. We've been here too long, and I think we've overstayed our welcome."

"I'm not leaving," Arizona says back, and there is no hesitancy in his voice. He cannot leave. He is chained to the table. Arizona Merviere, the grown man that he is, spends more time in the Capitol than he does back home, where his son and daughter who see him lesser than he sees his brother, await for him at the door everyday, but he cannot go home to the fake woman in his house that doesn't love him, the woman who is only there so he is not hanging on the gallows by midday, where she is in it for the money, because he can promise her wealth and fame than what anyone else in District 10 could, since Hector has remained unmarried, and doesn't seem interested in starting anytime soon. "You wasted your time coming down here."

Hector locks his jaw, as if he is about to argue, setting down both suitcases and sitting in the seat, but at an angle, so his hips jut over the edges. He extends his right hand to tap in an irregular beat on the chrome tabletop, doing so on purpose. Arizona's left eyelid begins to twitch at the pattern of unconformity, every few beats entirely different from the previous ones. "I figured you'd say that," his brother rubs at his brow, "So I prepared a few reasons," Hector begins counting on his fingers. "One, your tribute, Victoria, died all the way back on the first day, Ari. Two, Hero died four days ago, and we've been sitting around for nothing. Three, we've stayed because of the Career alliance, which is pure courtesy, and I am positive that the Careers are ending today, that Valencia will split off, while Milor and Carrion stay together. Four, I don't want anyone to get on to you."

"On to me about what?" Arizona asks innocently, tilting his head. He is not going to be scared of phantom threats from an administration that has no spine, he is not going to run back home with his tail between his legs and abandon his wife to the clawed talons of the Capitol. What does his brother take him for?

His brother musters a glare that rivals one Bonnie could give in the pinnacle of her pissed off moods. "I am not saying it out loud; you don't know who could be listening."

"I think you're just paranoid."

"I think you're too reckless!" Hector snaps. "That recklessness could get our entire family killed. Mom, Dad, me, you, your wife, and _your kids!_ All because you don't want to play by the rules..." he softens his tone a bit, since the sudden rise in volume gets a couple of the patrons to look their way. Victor gossip is the best gossip, the only gossip in the Capitol that plays true importance in their lives. "I'm just trying to look out for you, Ari."

"I think you're trying to keep me locked in a cage," Arizona whispers back at him, leaning forward of the mug, tone rather icily.

Hector has always been the way to press a hand against his shoulder to keep him back, to keep him at bay. Perhaps he doesn't want to be left under tabs! Perhaps he wants to be free, to flap his wings and extend them so he can fly high above in the clouds, where there aren't any rules, where people would stop judging him. Perhaps he wants to dance with the devil, hand in hand, tangoing left and right, until it turns into the flamenco, and there's a sharp twang of Latin jazz music in the background. What if he wants to be the daring individual who rushes forward and places the gun against his forehead, begging for it go off, since he's seeking a sweet release from the worldly torment around him?

What if?

His brother looks as if he swallowed a crow, or maybe he ate crow instead. "You worry me more than I want to admit."

Arizona leans forward, grabbing his brother's wrist, his skin hot, to his brother's clammy feel. "I'm staying because Hale is staying. She's staying because there are Careers alive, and that Persephone died later in the game. You are more than welcome to go home, Hector, but I am staying right here with her."

Hector locks his jaw, looking away for a minute. He had stopped the tapping awhile ago, his hands poised in the air has if to resume the sequence, but he does not, instead the hands falling into his lap. "Did you hear about Hale and Kevia yesterday morning in the Viewing Center?"

He shakes his head in dissent. "I heard about it, but I didn't see anything," but panic does rise in his veins. As long as Arizona doesn't show it, then perhaps it will go unnoticed and his wife's sudden anger at a lifelong ally will blow over. Wind of it will reach Calhoun or Bonnie's ears eventually - more likely Bonnie, that viper has eyes and ears everywhere - and with Hale going after one of their more noticeable and public confidants, his blood pressure peaks higher than it has before yesterday, when he requests an Avox perform a health check-up on him.

"Things are going to happen that are out of your control, and I just don't want you to be here when that happens," Hector says.

"I know what you mean," Arizona lifts his head, a ball forming in his throat. "I can't abandon my wife, Hector. She's my everything."

His brother gets to his feet, grabbing only his suitcase, the other for his brother. "If she's your everything, don't you think it would be wise to try and protect her?"

"I've already given you my answer, Hector. It's not going to change."

Hector sighs, running a hand through his hair, shaking his head, almost turning the sigh into a chuckle. "God help me with you, Ari. Sometimes I wonder if it would've ever been easier on me had you just died in the arena..."

Before Arizona can even say anything, his brother - the coward, the coward, the coward! - picks up his suitcase, walking back out into the bright daylight, suitcase in hand, towing memories of who knows what with him. Arizona watches him go, watches Hector mesh in with the bustling Capitol populace crowd, unable to say anything, his entire body buzzing with the revelation of what his brother just dropped on him.

His own flesh and blood wishes him dead, or _wished_ him dead, and that does absolutely nothing for his self confidence.

He turns back to the coffee, bringing it to his lips, taking a sip, before spitting it out and cursing again.

It's cold.

He hates cold coffee, almost as much as he hates pure black coffee, and almost as much as he hates his brother.

Dammit.

* * *

 ** _Master of Ceremonies Pollux Aetos P.O.V_**

* * *

Pollux wonders on occasion if there is a man in the sky that sits on a throne created from clouds, holding a judge's gavel entirely sculpted out of diamonds, dolling out cruel and unusual punishments _just_ because he can. No rhyme. No reason. Just because, as this is the fifth time in two weeks this thought has come into his head, when he is sitting in his office, the home away from home, and the beautiful, wonderful, fantastic Lewlyn Davis comes walking into the room, manila folders in hand.

He sits up abruptly, having been leaning back, feet on the desk, tie unkempt, and... zipper down, pants at his ankles, clad in only his underwear, which were the next thing to go. If Lewlyn notices, she doesn't say anything, instead rather kept to herself in the back of the room.

"You ever heard of knocking?" Pollux snaps at her, scooting forward, trying to not notice the intense warmth spreading across his face.

"You ever heard of human decency?" Lewlyn retorts just as coldly, but before the Master of Ceremonies could speak another word, she holds up her unoccupied hand. "I'm not in for a barbing session, Pollux. Let's just make this as professional as we can, okay?"

Is this maturity? Pollux frowns. _Maturity?_ From Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis? Pollux wonders if he needs his ears cleaned.

"You being mature?" he raises an eyebrow, tilting his head. "I never thought that was possible from someone as despicable as you."

Lewlyn flashes an iconic smile, in this case there are too many teeth, there is too much going on facially for it to look good, and he can see her grab a bundle of her paisley colored dress in her hand. He smirks to himself, back into his desk, while pulling up at his pants. Anything he can do to get under the woman's skin means a victory for him, a victory he will gladly, _gladly_ take. Of course Lewlyn wants to come walking in during private time - he's not quite sure if that could count as irony, a distasteful pun, or an amazing joke - but there's not much he can do about it now except try to not expose himself.

She undoes the clump of fabric in her hand, dropping it, and bringing the two hands together. "You should try it sometime," she says sweetly. "Maturity. After all, it has began to work wonders in my life." Pollux is pretty sure he just puked up his breakfast in his mouth, and he wants to do nothing more than spew it at her instead, the way she throws her barbs and breaks his skin and hurts him. She hurts him by merely existing. "But you're going to have try harder than that, Pollux, to make me angry again."

He scowls, sitting up, pants now fully adjusted where there is no white waistband showing, Pollux zipping the zipper up its path as quietly as he can before it makes any sudden, unwarranted noises that could most definitely expose him. Pollux is reaching for whatever could make him laugh, here. "You do know, however, that you can't come barging in her unannounced. Why didn't you leave a call with my secretary?"

"You don't have a secretary."

"Her name is Patricia. Hired her last week," Pollux says absentmindedly. Actually, he isn't quite sure a woman named Patricia even lives in the Capitol, and besides, he wouldn't want another person whose first name began with the same letter as his to actually be his assistant; this _Patricia,_ should such a person in his life exist is probably some airhead who wears five inch heels that are a size too big for her, stumbling over the office. "If you were to ever get away from your brother's dick, maybe you'd notice that we do have changes around here."

Lewlyn's eyes flash a dangerous, almost serene emerald green, and he swallows fearfully. Pollux likes to think he's her equal, but in true testament, he isn't. Of every Capitol official, his job is the one that can be replaced the most readily; he is unable to stop reaching into the fire, however, as that moment of being burned in the best feeling in the world. That, and the feeling of Rennie's teeth skirting over his chest, but Pollux is trying to forget about all that. It is a one night moment, and he enjoys it, but it's been two weeks, and it's gone, it's over, and it's never coming back.

The Head Gamemaker pinches her nostrils instead of the bridge, which Pollux cocks his head at. There is no way anyone could ever define _who_ Lewlyn Davis was, because he is at a loss for words, which he never is. "The reason why I didn't schedule an appointment is because Calhoun needed me to speak to you before the end of the day."

At the mentioning of the president, all joking and barbing that sits inside Pollux's mind goes flying out the window, he immediately sitting straight up. Had his pants been wrapped around his ankles, they would've fallen to the floor at that point. It has been even more awkward than that, at the time Bonnie walks into his apartment, which he had stupidly left unlocked, seeing his butt in all of its glory... and then, _well,_ Rennie's seen him fully naked. Let him touch him. Let him kiss him.

Pollux shakes his head, squeezing his eyes shut for a second. He will stop thinking about Rennie Davis, the brother to the psychopath standing in front of him.

"Calhoun? Speak to me about what?" For being his best friend, Pollux never sees him, and the two had been through everything together at one point in their lives, picking out the girls to whom they'd push into the main fountain at school, or run around the streets of the Capitol late at night, streaking, running away from Peacekeepers, they never being caught, because they can run much faster as spry young men than hulking ogres in gray metallic suits of armor.

Lewlyn makes a step forward to the seat in front of his desk, but instead only rests her hand on it instead. "Today it is not the Top Five. Yesterday we had the Top Seven, and two days ago was the Top Eight. Can you remind me, Pollux, what you're supposed to do when the nine tributes in the arena, on the very _next_ day, get turned into the remaining eight surviving tributes in the arena?" she pauses for emphasis, but Pollux doesn't say anything. He'd bet his entire wardrobe of velvet and cashmere that the moment he opens his mouth to say something, she'd cut him off in that smart way only Lewlyn knows. "The family and friends interviews of those final eight."

He snaps his fingers, shaking his head.

"Ah! I knew I was forgetting something!" Pollux's voice couldn't be any more insincere.

She balls her tongue on one side of her mouth, behind her teeth. "If that's the case, then why didn't you do it? Why didn't you do your job?" she tilts her head again, Lewlyn parting her mouth open. "In fact, I feel like I'm always the one stepping into your presence to always ask you to do your job. Why is that?"

Pollux shrugs. "I didn't do it because I _didn't_ want to do it," he throws her a gesture that speaks ' _I don't care_ '. "I don't know what you want me to say, Lewlyn."

"I just don't think Calhoun is going to take an 'I forgot' or an 'I don't want to' as an acceptable answer that does not involve your resignation," Lewlyn folds her hands together on top of the chair. "For the first time in my life, Pollux, I am actually wanting to help you not get fired."

There are days when Pollux Aetos, interviewer extraordinaire, absolutely loves his job. There are the days when there is nothing he wants to do more than stand on that gilded Capitol stage and wave to the adoring fans that watch him in the audience, as well as those all across Panem, where there are surely some, if he looks at all the fan mail he will never write back to stuffed in his closet. The spotlights are warm across his skin, his heartbeat matches the tempo and rhythm of the applause, and his entire body is covered in goosebumps.

However, there are the days where Pollux stands on the stage to bring truth to a tragedy that needs to be discussed, for it will affect the entire nation. There are days when someone who is against his sexual orientation will take whatever is in their pockets and throw it at him, ruining the suit he pays good money for. There are days when the times he actually has an assistant falls down and breaks her leg due to those stupid, _stupid_ high heels, and Pollux Aetos does not want to go to the auditorium and speak to a brain dead crowd who only clap because he himself encourages it.

"I'm sorry," Pollux shrugs once more. "Calhoun is going to have to simply take that as my final answer."

Lewlyn shakes her head, clucking her tongue. "If it wasn't for your arrogance, sometimes I think I could actually stand your company," and then a light pause, where Lewlyn throws the manila folder onto his desk. "Calhoun expects that we'll get a victor within the next couple of days, and those are the questions you'll be asking in the interview," and then there's another pause, one where Lewlyn looks down at the ground, trailing her shoe in a square shape across the tile. "After that, I don't know if you'll still have your job. Calhoun hates rule breaking, you know that; he's a man of rules and order."

A spark ignites in his head.

Pollux sits back in his chair, bringing one knee to cross over the other, placing his hands folder together on the crease. "That's curious," he ponders for a moment, bringing out the curves of his smile. "How come you can break the rules of the Capitol and the moment I do, there's a chance of me being fired?"

Lewlyn blinks as if she's a robot being restarted. "I don't-" she starts.

 _Oh no she doesn't._ Pollux interrupts her before she could spew anymore of her bullshit; Lewlyn Davis is poisonous. "You, due to jealousy, ripped your brother's tongue out of his mouth. You convicted him of treason and turned him into a mute. You force him to have sex with you because you couldn't get a man otherwise, and then you release him from your service, which proved to us all along of _your_ treason," he turns his telling face into a snarl. "Tell me, Lewlyn, how come Calhoun has let you get away with that treason? I highly doubt my best friend would ever think of your brother actually committing treason."

She puckers her lips, sucking the bottom lip in. "Calhoun signed the order, didn't he? He had to believe me somehow," and then Lewlyn looks down at her hands again, down to her feet. "A decision I'm regretting every day, Pollux. You know what I'm doing. I'm trying to make amends."

"You can't make amends for what you've done, not to him," a lump forms in his throat. "Your brother has Stockholm Syndrome, Lewlyn, because you're family, and because you two had sex. You'd be surprised how much an Interviewer would learn when talking with people; it's my job," he says flippantly. "You can't make amends to anyone that you've ever wronged, Lewlyn. Say what you want about me, and my arrogance, but you're a monster."

Lewlyn lifts her head, eyes cloudy, gaze somewhat judgmental, but she's got no ammo in her holster, and Pollux knows he's won this one. She digs into her fingernails, picking and scabbing, smiling wryly. "Just... just look over the questions, Pollux."

She turns to leave, beginning to make her way out the door, but Pollux isn't letting her out of the leviathan's jaw that easily.

"Do you actually think Rennie is in the process of forgiving you?" he asks.

The Head Gamemaker pauses, one hand resting on the edge of the door, and her gaze goes to the floor, and then towards the Master of Ceremonies, piercing right through him, a phasing so hard that Pollux feels it resting right above his sternum. "Somehow, through all the terrible I've done, Rennie is forgiving me. I am learning how to speak to him through sign language. I've set him free... and yes, Rennie is still my brother, and I'm still his sister."

"Rennie wouldn't be lying to you?"

Lewlyn smiles wryly once more, her eyes saddened. "Rennie wouldn't lie to me. He doesn't lie, Pollux."

Pollux shakes his head. "Your brother isn't as innocent as you think, Davis. Rennie isn't some fragile flower. He's a player at the game just like the rest of us," he bares his teeth at the Gamemaker. "A wolf in sheep's clothing, Lewlyn," he places a hand on his zipper, slowly undoing the line. "Now, do me a favor, and get the hell out of my office."

She regards him with another cold stare, this one narrowed, and then Lewlyn is out of there.

The Head Interviewer shakes his pants all the way down to his ankles, tugging at the waistband of his underwear, and having electricity spasm between his fingertips and his sex. When his toes curl, and Pollux tosses his head back, and he's sighing and when he's grateful that there isn't a secretary named Patricia hearing every word of this, Pollux cries out.

Rennie's name is on his lips as Pollux sees stars.

* * *

 ** _President of Panem Calhoun Rodney P.O.V_**

* * *

His side aches. Calhoun believes it to be stress, but it might be because he's ingesting too many acidic foods, or drinking too much wine. Maybe it is the poison that is dabbed on the lipstick Bonnie uses to coat her lips, which lingers when he kisses her for too long, passing like a virus from host to host, a flea tired of one living condition to the other.

Calhoun is standing in the main living room out of four in the mansion, throwing his clothes into a hamper. Yes, he knows there are servants and attendees to his every need, but sometimes a man of power needs to be able to do his own laundry, and it does not hurt him every once in awhile to do so, it does not lower his status as the leader of Panem; let the gossip columns say what they want to say should a lucky photographer snap a second of domestication. He runs a hand along his forehead, bunching a few dress shirts into the hamper.

The sound of someone's heels walking on tile going _clack, clack, clack,_ heading in his direction, and when he looks over to the left, at the sound of the noise, the wide double-doors, beautifully ornate and decorated in ivory, push open, Bonnie strolling through into their living room, lit up by the chandelier above her. He smiles, and his body warms up a few more degrees, although he is already hot in the insufferable August heat.

"Good morning, sweetheart," he says, walking over to her, kissing her on the lips. One of his hands goes to cup her face, the other resting on her belly. He is still in awe over this, over this fact that there's a life of their very own inside her, a piece of him and a piece of her doing something wonderful, something magical... and it'll be his own child, someone who can individually call him _Father._ A chill laces through him. Bonnie makes a soothed noise inside her throat, and he releases his hold on her, holding her by the sides, a warm smile plastered across his face. "You're home early. Easy morning?" he asks, going back to the hamper, throwing more clothes in.

Bonnie looks behind her, walking backwards, collapsing rather humorously onto the couch, kicking her legs in the air. Calhoun raises an eyebrow, seeing her legs exposed. No underwear. _Oh._ She grabs the straps to her heels, undoing them, wrenching the shoe off her feet, and pushing them away, bringing her feet closer to her, massaging over her ankles. "An alright day," she says, then lightly hisses, rubbing over a spot that is slightly inflamed. "Those heels are too small for my feet."

"Then why do you wear them and not the pairs that fit you?"

"They're the wrong color," Bonnie shakes her head. "Besides, I don't want to be the First Lady who is known as the woman who owns too many shoes, as I could very well be the reason why there are people starving in District 12."

If that is meant to be a joke, Calhoun does not laugh, nor does he find it very funny. There _are_ people in District 12 starving, and he wants to improve that, and maybe improving that means dropping the Hunger Games after a hundred years, after the Districts have learned to not cross the hand that feeds them, to not bite down and steal the gift out of their hands before they even realize what they're taking.

Calhoun scratches the back of his head, hair standing on end. "Are you hungry? I could have Clyde cook us lunch."

"I'm alright," Bonnie frowns lightly, still massaging her ankles. "I'm not that hungry," she undoes the hair clip holding the back of her hair up, which then tumbles down as liquidous lemonade being poured out of a pitcher, which splatters onto a reflective surface. Calhoun bites his lower lip, adjusting himself, clearing his throat. Not the time. Not the time. "After all, I pretty much just had to force my entire team to go home. They took that as being fired, for some reason," another shake of the head. "People confuse me."

The president combs through the pairs of socks, trying to match them the best he can. He has way too many pairs of brown socks for any normal human being. "Why did you make them go home?"

She looks at him as if he has a loose screw. "Honey, don't you realize that we're far into the Games already? It's the eighth day, and we're down to the final five tributes. Both of the mutts are dead, which means I don't have a job anymore; I have nothing more to monitor. It's all in Lewlyn's hands now," and Bonnie leans back onto the couch, still keeping one of her ankles wrenched close to her. Calhoun raises an eyebrow. This might be the first time in their entire marriage that he's heard his wife say the Head Gamemaker's name without spitting sulfuric acid as the syllables leave her lips. As he's folding the rest of the socks together, she scoffs. "I'm still in shock..." she mutters.

"Shock over what?" Calhoun asks, walking into his office for a minute, grabbing a pair of his dress shoes underneath the desk. When he walks back into the living room, Bonnie's lips are pursed in an 'o' shape, and he tries not to look disquieted. It is as if she had said that and had been hoping he didn't hear her, given her face. Calhoun sets his shoes down onto the counter where the hamper sits, grabbing a dryer sheet and running it on the inside of the shoes, picking up grime built over time. "Shock over what?" he repeats the question, after she doesn't say anything, sitting in her silence.

Bonnie stares at her husband, running a hand down her arm, one hand grabbing onto the edge of her dress, a simple red and white half pattern, fingers pulling at the laces at her shoulder. "I've been betrayed again, Calhoun. I keep on getting stabbed in the back by everybody in this administration."

He drops the socks, he drops the shoes, he drops the dryer sheets, he leaves the laundry, and he joins his wife. Calhoun crouches down low, heels digging into the rug, he dragging it with him slightly. He places a hand up against his wife's face, she shuddering into the touch. "Bonnie, what are you not telling me?"

She looks at him, eyes a distant and hazardous gray, like thunderstorms pealing off across a valley. "Rennie is going behind my back. Kevia has betrayed my trust and stolen from me. Pollux is insubordinate, Lewlyn is treasonous..." Bonnie shudders in her husband's grip, squeezing her eyes shut. "I'm fighting this all alone, Calhoun. You aren't there with me, battling what I'm battling! I'm doing it all by myself, the governing and politicizing. I'm carrying a child and fighting rebellion, and you aren't by my side!"

His heart sinks into his chest. Has he not been there? Has he not been the husband that his wedding vows have asked for him to be? How has he betrayed his flesh and blood in such a manner?

Calhoun, with the other free hand, runs a circle across her knuckles, hoping it soothes her. "I am and have been fighting right alongside you, Bonnie; I will continue to fight for you as long as I have life in me. You are my _wife,_ and I love you."

"Then treat me like one," Bonnie suddenly rasps, eyes starting to become bloodshot, as a few tears slide down her cheek, and she stands up, vaulting him off of her, she stepping into the center of the living room, holding herself tight.

He turns around, getting back onto his feet, unsure whether or not to approach her, whether or not to lay his hands across her back, to suckle on her neck. "Bonnie? What is it?"

She lifts her head, as if she is debating what to say next, before she turns to him, and there are clear tears in her eyes, crystalline rivers that spill down her face. "Have you been keeping secrets from me? Are you doing things behind my back?"

A spear of ice rams straight into Calhoun's heart, which skips a beat, and one hand of his immediately goes diving down into his pocket to clench the fabric there. "What?" he asks, his voice barely above a whisper, as if it is a ghost from time's past speaking over his shoulder. He curls his toes in his shoes, trying to not curse, trying to not sweat, as his entire world could come crashing down at any moment, any moment the secret could come out, the jig could be up, and he would've committed treason of his own. "Bonnie, I-"

"Are you?" she lifts her head up, tilting it back, defiance at its finest.

"Of course not," Calhoun shakes his head. God, is he sweating? That'd give it away, wouldn't it? "I don't keep secrets." However, his heart is cursing at him, telling him an entirely different mantra. He sucks; he's evil, he's hiding information from his wife and giving it to her arch-nemesis. Could he betray his wife in any worse way? He scratches again at the back of his head. "I'm not hiding anything, Bonnie. I'd never."

"Calhoun, I-"

She takes a step towards him, extending a hand. He grabs it as quickly as he can, bringing her even closer to his chest, so she can place her hand on his heart, feeling the beat that drums underneath the cloth, the beat that drums against her skin, causing fluttering spurts of warmth to spready everywhere. He holds her hand there, just for a second, and then places his next hand up against her stomach.

He presses his hand a bit stronger onto her womb.

"You and I have a child together, Bonnie, something we've been wanting our whole marriage. I will be sticking by you for however long you want me to, and I will do whatever I can to be your husband," Calhoun presses a kiss against her forehead. "Do you believe me?"

Bonnie bites on the inside of her lip. "I- I believe you," she shakes her head, stuttering out a laugh. "I- I think I'm just too paranoid right now. Caught in my whirlwind of emotions, after all."

He gently swipes a thumb underneath one of her eyes. "You are the most beautiful woman in the world, and I am the luckiest man in the world to be married to you."

She coos a bit at the touch. "Well, _now_ you're lying."

He kisses her again. "Now, if you'd be so kind, can you go and get your clothes for me? I want to give them to Anita before the end of the day."

It is an odd request, he's sure, to segue from such topics. He watches her wander over to their bedroom, to go into her closet, because there is no way he's digging through his wife's lingerie to see what he can throw into the dirty clothes. As Bonnie vanishes behind the wall for a split second, he runs a hand through his hair, heart beating a mile a minute. Has she found out? Has she figured out that he wants to end the Hunger Games? How else would she randomly ask if he is keeping secrets from her? How else would such a thing happen?

Her blonde hair appears from behind the wall first, the rest of her following afterward, a large bunch of her clothes bundled in her hands. "Isn't it another vote-off tonight?"

"For the final five, yes," Calhoun answers, absentmindedly, returning to his clothes, trying to not think about how their marriage somehow nearly just ended, but now they've moved on. It is the Rodney way, to move on, to not care, to make things simply act like water under the bridge. "Why do you ask?"

Bonnie places the heap of clothes next to Calhoun's, wiping her hands off. "Weren't there supposed to be four of them?"

He closes his eyes, nodding his head. That's right. The original twist, the original card, which is what Pollux reads and announces to the entire nation on the morning of the reapings, is that there are supposed to be four of the vote-offs, and instead, it had been dwindled down to two. "You're right, we were supposed to have four," he bundles a few more sock pairs together as he speaks. "It was supposed to be 18th, 14th, 10th, and 5th. 18th was Victoria, and well... someone died in those places instead, so we didn't have a vote," he shrugs his shoulders. "I don't think I care, honestly, Bonnie. It is an odd concept as it is."

She chews on the inside of her cheek, moving over to the couch again, bringing her heels close together. "What happens when there's a tie for the vote-off?" Calhoun looks over at her, but he doesn't say anything, so she continues. "There was an overwhelming majority vote for Victoria on the first one, but with only five tributes, what if there's a tie? Either everyone has one vote for someone else, which is possible, but rather impossible, or there's a tie of two and two. There can't be any other options for a tie, right? It would have to go in a three versus two sort of deal, or a four versus one," she sucks on her bottom lip, "So, my original question. What if there was a tie?"

Calhoun squeezes his eyes shut again, placing the shirt he is holding in his hands to the side, and then he looks up at the paneling above them. He wants a glass of whiskey right now, to dull the throbbing pain in his side. "I have to break the tie," that is the only rule not said aloud in the announcement, that President Calhoun Rodney of Panem breaks the tie, voting for whichever tribute he believes should die; he doesn't believe that he could somehow have that in him, another reason why he wants to end said establishment in its entirety. "I have to vote for whichever tribute out of the die I feel deserves to die."

"And what if you didn't?" Bonnie asks.

"Didn't do what?"

"Vote as the tiebreaker? What if you voted randomly and just picked someone random to die? That'd be rather unpredictable, right? That'd cause the viewership to go up, I'm assuming."

The president looks at his wife, this time turning to her, and he folds his hands together, fiddling with his wedding ring. "Are you asking me to cheat and rig the vote?"

Bonnie coos again in her throat. "I'm not asking you to do anything, honey. I'm merely making a suggestion," she gets to her feet, holding her heels, the leather resting against her hip, in her left hand. "Besides, you are the man of legacy. Think of what the history books would say about this Quarter Quell because President Calhoun Rodney went through a loophole?"

" _Legacy,_ " his mind thinks. " _The legacy of being the president of Panem who writes tyranny out of history, instead of being the one condoning their horrific deaths,_ " and then out loud to his wife, "Bonnie, you're asking the man who follows the rules, who wants order... you're asking me to break my own moral code."

Her eyes flash the thunderstorm color again. "Consider it, Calhoun. You'd throw egg all over their faces," she runs a finger down his arm, sensuously, chills erupting all over his skin. "If you won't do it for your legacy, do it for me, then. Do it for your wife."

He looks at her painfully, those words being a slice and a stab through his heart. She presses herself into his side, hugging him, and wanders off elsewhere into the mansion. Where? He's not sure, but he doesn't want to go after her and try to make sense of whatever conversation they've just had. He is beautifying the wicked, and if the wicked happens to be his wife of many years, than he's irrevocably screwed.

Calhoun shakes his head in confusion. Bonnie asking him, in the case that there is a tie, to break the rules? Truth be told, now that he even considers it, there's no one on the planet besides him or Lewlyn, and now Bonnie, that knows of said extra bullet point.

He- wait, _what is that?_

The president's mind is going in fifty million directions at first, sifting through the clothes Bonnie gives him to send to Anita so she can wash them, and it had been about a month give or take since the last large load. It is a pair of her underwear that catch his eye, and Calhoun has always found it odd that there's some strange sense of forbidden aura to his wife's underwear when he isn't pulling them off of her with his teeth, but the moment he sees them outside of the bedroom when the candles are lit and the lights dimmed low, his skin itches like he's bathing in a pool full of worms.

He furrows his eyebrows again, frowning. What is that?

Calhoun picks the pair of panties out of the pile, they being stark white, like a fresh snowflake from a blizzard.

Using his other hand, he plucks the curiosity off of the material, bringing it into the light.

A hair.

A long, _long,_ curly hair.

A bright auburn, long piece of curly hair on his wife's underwear.

* * *

 **Well, I think the chapter got a bit away from me, not going to lie, as goodness, that was fun! This was Chapter #40: Beautifications of the Wicked, the continuation of our OC Capitol storyline, and I must say ladies and gentlemen, we're taking the final breaths before the plunge, as there are only eleven more chapters after this one, three of which are arena chapters... the end is oh so very near.**

 **So, without obviously giving too much away so you all can sit and mediate on what has been said and discussed and argued, Arizona is staying behind in the Capitol while Hector goes home, Lewlyn and Pollux are at an impasse, and it seems one will crumble before the other, Bonnie believes everyone is out to get her, and she's asked Calhoun to break and bend the rules should a voting tie occur. And, yeah, hair on underwear, big whoop.**

 **I think this might be one of the best chapters recently, and I am so proud of myself for having this finished three days earlier than I expected. I hope you all review, it'd make my day, on what you think is going on, plot predictions and stuff, and just... god, I love ya'll commenting, more than you think I might. Next chapter, Chapter #41: Vengeance in Our Veins, is an arena chapter, where we'll have the final five vote-off (so get the votes in), and then Chapters 42-44 will be three consecutive OC Capitol storyline chapters, as the arena storyline will continue and resume by Chapter #45.**

 **Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope you all have an amazing day! Love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	41. Vengeance In Our Veins (Day 8)

**Hey everybody, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #41: Vengeance in our Veins, and man oh man ladies and gentlemen we are here in the homestretch, as we are down to the final five - Valencia, Milor, Carrion, Peri, and Linden - where we have three Careers and District 7 duking it out for the crown, and today, fellow readers, is the Final Five vote-off, and I think said thing beneath here will really shock a whole lot of you. This will be a long chapter, as every tribute alive will have POV's from here on out in the last three arena chapters, as there are only two more left to be had, victory is soon upon us, and then the resuming of the Capitol arc after that. Please enjoy Chapter #41: Vengeance in our Veins.**

* * *

 ** _Carrion Bastion: District 4 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

The Games need to end. That is the truth, and Carrion cannot take it anymore. His entire body feels as if it is engaging shut-down mode, and he has no idea how to stop it or engage in some sort of way to make the pain end. He wipes at his brow, more exhausted than the day before, and more exhausted than the day before that. If he thought he hadn't felt well the morning Annabellina went running into a mutt's arms to be the end of herself, he must be a thousand times worse than that today. He awakes with a start, having been lying down on a bench, wrapped up in a sleeping bag or two, dark hair matted to his forehead, slick with sweat, and he's freezing.

Milor's name is caught in his throat, a choke here or there when the syllables are stuck up by his Adam's apple, and Carrion rolls off of the bench onto the gravel, grunting in pain. It snaps his boyfriend awake as well, who had been sleeping right up against said bench, holding onto Carrion's hand from the ground, and Milor awakes when the District 4 male rolls over and off the bench onto his body. Milor lets out a light yelp, which then causes Valencia, who had fallen asleep keeping watch up against one of the large oak trees in the vicinity of the bench to draw her sword.

"What's going on?" she shouts, rather loudly, which makes Carrion wince, but he keeps on forgetting that there is literally not a single soul left alive in the arena save for them three and the District 7 brats, kids he hasn't seen since the bloodbath, and faces he hasn't seen shine in the sky, so he knows they must be still breathing.

Carrion gets off of Milor, who is clutching his chest fiercely, coughing. He places his hands on the concrete, trying to get his feet, and it is one of the most excruciating things he's ever dealt with, and getting injured in the fight with Marcus had been no walk in the park - the guy had been thrown through a mirror, stabbed in the leg, sliced open on the arm, and other bruises - but this might take the cake for the worst pain he's been in, minus some killer headaches.

"Nothing," he says weakly, stumbling back, resting against a stone column holding the building up. "I just roll off the bench and-"

"And fell on me," Milor groans, rubbing his head, sitting up. He shakes his head, and then looks up at Carrion, any semblance of annoyance or pain washing away at the relief on his face, a huge smile plastered across the other boy's features. "Good morning, darling. How you feeling?"

"Never better," Carrion hisses through clenched teeth, readjusting himself.

Valencia walks over past the two boys, standing in the spot that the cloud cover pokes through the trees to see the arena clock. Carrion observes her look at the sky for a moment, a gentle breeze blowing her hair all over, and then their fearless leader cusses, stamping her foot in frustration, shaking her head. "Dammit," she swears, turning around, marching to her sleeping bag, beginning to roll it up, sword still by her side.

He and Milor share a look together, and odd look, where he has his eyebrows raised. Why the sudden abrasiveness and freak out? Carrion is having a hard time thinking straight, let alone even standing on his own two feet, as without Milor, he might topple over. He does not need Valencia to go on one of her wild freaking sprees, since there is no Persephone to hold her by the shoulders and kiss her face and whisper sweet nothings into her ear to remedy the situation.

"What's wrong?" Milor frowns, rubbing his shoulders innocuously.

"We slept in late," Valencia grumbles, struggling to put her sword in her sheath, which has been wrapped around her waist all night, he wincing, trying to think of how uncomfortable that must've been, trying to sleep with it digging into her spine. "Again!" the exasperation drips off of her words, like venom slipping out off of a snake's fangs. "Peri and Linden have probably moved camp four times today, knowing we'd be on their tails."

Another look are shared between the two men, and Carrion furrows his eyebrows together. "Valencia, it isn't the end of the world if we don't-"

"Wouldn't you like to go home?" she snaps, looking up at him, diamond eyes almost black with fury. A bristling crack of electricity sparks across his skin, all the hair standing on edge. "To get home, Carrion, we have to kill District 7."

Milor extends his hands out gently. "Val, listen to me, this is nothing to get upset over-"

"I'm not upset!" Valencia yells, enraged, throwing her sleeping bag in the air, all the contents inside fluttering everywhere into the air, landing all haphazardly around the ground. One of the copies of the arena maps, found in another container when the group had split their three ways to the obelisk, glints off of the sunlight, landing in the planter of a nearby tree. The girl from District 1 sits back down on her sleeping bag, running a hand through her blonde hair, shaking her head, breathing heavily.

Last night, after the three of them stumbled to this campsite for the evening, after Milor ends Colt's life with a merciful swing of his sword, Valencia is eerily quiet. Unlike before, with Persephone, where she sobs into the crook of her neck, or when she is babbling about failure after Marcus's betrayal, this is different. It is more subdued, and in this case, angry. Most questions seem to set her off, where they would not have angered Valencia before, that he observes by how she holds onto the hilt of her sword, it having been a bit more relaxed, and the largest one of the bunch, dangling off the side of that shop's awning, which meant Galiant's death, and yet she hasn't killed a single person since then in the arena... Carrion has had more kills than the famed leader of the Career pack, more kills than the highest scoring tribute... maybe he _should_ lead.

"Valencia, what's wrong?" he asks, taking a step forward, unable to go any further, as the white lines of agony begin to disrupt his vision. Milor reaches up to keep him at bay, to keep him steady, but Carrion shoos off the help. There have been worse hangovers, and it is only the leg wound that is causing him the trouble.

She looks away for a second, balling up a fist underneath her chin, jaw locked. Valencia scoffs, shaking her head. "It's about Colt..." her voice is hardly higher than a whisper. Valencia swallows heavily. "The night of the Interviews, I tried to get Colt to join in the alliance," Carrion remembers that moment, the little huddle up they had on the first floor, where each one had been assigned a floor or tribute to go speak with: Valencia had Colt, Marcus went to talk to Annabellina, Milor spoke to District 10 - clearly _that_ worked, Carrion thinks snidely - Persephone tried coaxing Alexandra to their side, Maisey refused to speak with anyone, and Carrion asked Corvus, who told him to go to hell. Valencia got Colt, who she thought would've been the easiest to sway.

"He refused, clearly," Milor says, blinking, as if it is obvious. Carrion gives his boyfriend a sharp look, the girl is hurting, their leader de facto is bothered, and the District 2 male is going to be snide.

Valencia wipes at her runny nose, having the thousand-yard stare. "He refused, because he was going to protect Gaia in the arena," she looks at her allies. "Maisey beheaded her, and my offer was a one-time deal. I think that is where he got his idea for his own alliance, and that didn't work either..." Valencia rubs the back of her neck. "I gave him an ultimatum, his district partner, or the Careers, since I wanted us to try and override the whole voting thing and pick and choose who we wanted to eliminate, but that didn't up working the first night, and we lost Victoria..." she shakes her head. "You saw how he looked yesterday. He was injuring himself, shaking like crazy, and _gone._ It had only been a week. What happened in that one week to make him lose his mind?" Valencia bites on the knuckles on her left hand, sucking on one of them. "I feel guilty for his demise, like I had a part to play in it-"

"You had nothing to do with that," Milor walked over to her, crouching down to look at her in the eyes. "You put too much blame on your shoulders, Val."

She looks up at him, breaking off into a light smile. "I wish I had your optimism, Milor," Valencia dusts her hands off, wiping at her eyes, there being a slight tear or two. Carrion wants to relate to her, to relate to his struggles, and perhaps his hypocrisy, since he saves Hero and Maisey after voting for Victoria, but it is all he could do, after betraying the alliance the first time. However, as he tries to muster the sympathy and empathy, he comes up with nothing. She wraps her sheath back around her waist, rerolling the sleeping bag up, and she goes over to grab the map. "Because I know what I need to do."

Carrion shifts over in his spot, crossing his arms. "What do you mean, Val?"

Valencia points at the map, back at the gray spot with the question mark, the unmarked area of the arena, and a chill laces through Carrion's body. "I still want to know what is over there. We are close, we're _very_ close to it. I don't know where Peri and Linden are, and I feel like everything is building to that area, and I am heading that way," she tries to elongate her posture. "I second guessed myself with Colt. I let Marcus back in the alliance. I didn't stand my ground against Maisey constantly fighting me, and I haven't defended the Career name like I should've," a perceptible shake of her head. "No longer, guys."

Milor sides back up against Carrion, placing one hand on his shoulder. "You want to go to the unknown zone?"

Carrion doesn't want to, he'll be honest. He wants a bourbon to dull the pain in his leg, he wants a scotch to remedy the agony that laces his back; he wants a vodka stinger to drown out the burning in his throat, he wants Milor in him and around him and he in Milor, but he does not want to join Valencia on another hair-brained scheme of hers, on another moment of trouble, something he simply cannot do.

He is afraid to look down and see what the wound looks like. They swapped bandages last night, after seeing Caiden, who must've been the cannon from earlier that day, and Colt's faces shine in the sky, and the skin has begun to pus and scab over, but it does not look good, and Carrion knows it has been infected with something, and time _is running out._ He cannot afford day trips to unknown areas of the arena that could be Gamemaker traps, he is simply not risking it.

A ball lumps in his throat, as Valencia's volatile state means she could end him here and now.

"I'm not going, Valencia," he says. "I can't," and he motions to his leg.

Milor's gaze follows down to the bandaged wound, which, although it is not stained a deep and putrid crimson like the first night four days ago, it is still nothing healthy. He looks at Valencia, hard and resolute. "If Carrion isn't going, neither am I," and he looks at his boyfriend lovingly. "You know I wouldn't leave him for anything."

Valencia takes a step back, her eyes passing back and forth from one to the other, and Carrion keeps his gaze on her right hand that is clenched around the hilt of the sword, in case she decides to tighten said grip and skewer both of them through the liver. Her voice is impossibly soft. "You know that when I get there, I'm not coming back. I'm not returning..."

"And then that means this is the end of the Careers," Carrion says with finality, trying to keep his tone jovial. Nothing like a depressing send-off, right? "We had a good run, don't you think?"

The two highest scoring tributes in the arena lock hands, after a pregnant pause, and then Valencia extends the goodbye into a hug, catching Milor off guard, who then pats her on the back. "Take care of Carrion, Milor," she says, and he is pretty sure there is a sniffle hidden in there somewhere.

When they release the hug, Milor has a tear or two in his eyes, but Carrion is emotionally unmoving. That bottle of vodka is now _extremely_ tempting. "You know I will," his voice is pained. He grabs Valencia's left hand and gives it a squeeze. "I hope, Valencia, when we see each other again," _Not if,_ Carrion notes, but _when,_ "We meet as friends and not as enemies."

She nods along to the sentiment. "I hope so too, Milor." Valencia grabs the sleeping back, holding it underneath her other arm, one of the three backpacks placed on one of her shoulders. Valencia gives a half hearted smile. "Thank you both for allowing me to lead as long as I did, for as long as I have, even if I don't deserve it."

Carrion, trying to not focus on the pain, gives a light smile. "Thanks for not giving up on us."

Valencia raises her head up, and lets out a long sigh. "I'll see you both on the other side, I hope. Let's give District 7 hell, huh?"

The head Career, the girl from District 1, missus Valencia Shale, then turns her back to he and Milor, walking off into the arena, where the gusts of wind and the light breezes still blow their hair around, and the tethering knot of the Careers is severed, with the slicing of a sword.

Milor faces Carrion, hugging him, pressing his lips up to his in a kiss, tasting of the sweet air, of masonry and of smoke, charcoal and blood, tears and sadness. When they break apart, Milor places a hand against the other male's face, and Carrion does likewise, the white lines of agony still there, but if he does not remember them being there, then they aren't a problem.

"I'm yours, and you're mine," Milor reaffirms, rubbing his cheek with his thumb.

"You're mine, forever and always," Carrion smiles back. _Forever might be only for tonight, Milor._

"We have a Hunger Games to win," the male from District 2 says soundly, nodding his head.

It's game on, Carrion thinks.

He has vengeance in his veins, and it is time that be expressed.

* * *

 ** _Peri Florence: District 7 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

The mornings bring on headaches, and they bring on pain. They bring on awkward breakfasts and stunted conversations when the only accompaniment in the vicinity are harsh gusts of wind. Peri awakes, covering her eyes from the beams of sunlight pouring onto her face. She groans, sitting upwards, and then looks down at her body, eyes widening. Why- why is she _naked?_ She looks over next to the form sleeping soundlessly beside her, and Peri's face burns the color of a tomato. Why- why is _he,_ Linden Hazel, _naked?_

She presses a hand to her forehead, sitting back. Oh no. Oh _no._ What did the two of them just do?

Peri furrows her eyebrows together, standing up some, retrieving her tribute uniform that is next to her lying in the grass, covered in ants. She knocks them off, and puts her shirt back on, loving the feel of the smooth design sliding over her skin after being exposed to the nightly chills. She looks back at Linden, who's body is being exposed to the whole world, a blush settling on her cheeks.

Did they just- did she just... did he _just?_ Her mind is a whirlwind of emotions. The last thing she remembers is biting a strawberry, watching Linden go down to the hill to sit up against said oak tree - a chill laces through her when she stares up at the piece of nature, it is quite beautiful and massive, and would make most trees in District 7 feel inferior - and then, and then... oh.

Another blush settles onto her cheeks. That is what she remembers. Kissing him. Pressing her body taut to his, hands roaming, hands searching, lips and teeth and tongues colliding, and her body is still dying. Peri does not know what she expects out of being awoken in this time, out of just having sex - her mind wants to break in two every time she thinks of the word - but she does not feel rejuvenated. She feels like shit, absolute dog shit. Peri is not going to lie, she expected to wake up as if the cancer had fled her body, and what is left behind is the husk of adrenaline given to her by Calhoun, but a thought is sitting in the back of her head for that, but she won't go into any further thoughts on that, since someone else is getting awoken.

Linden shuffles somewhat down in his spot, opening his eyes, rubbing them. Breaking through the umbra is her figure, obscured by the light, blocking it out like an eclipse. He covers his eyes with his hand, squinting at her. Another chill races through Peri's body, as this is reminiscent, almost an exactly same painted picture, of how it started. How it happened. "Good morning, Peri," he says.

"Good morning, Linden," she is having a hard time swallowing.

He looks down at his naked body - Peri feels awful for having her eyes raking over him, to land on endowment, and the way his chest is sculpted so perfectly chiseled, and then she stares at herself and the sagging skin, the dead skin eating away at what was there before - and immediately stands up to get dressed. She turns away from him for the moment, to give him some peace. _Peace, Peri? You slept with him! How is that for peaceful, huh? How? Why are you ashamed of his naked body now?_

She kicks herself in the side mentally, biting on the inside of her cheek to get her belligerent inner-self to shut the hell up. Linden zips his pants back up, throwing on the shirt, the delight of his body being hidden for the whole world once again, and he makes his way back up the hill. "How'd you sleep?" he asks her.

"Alright," Peri lies through her teeth. Her dreams are riddled with being chased by monsters, snakes and goblins, and Capitol mutts, but most of all, demonic figures that turn into her mother and father, but this time she is actually able to run away from them, unlike all the times where she'd be stuck as if trying to run through quicksand, and then the monsters manage to reach her. "How about you?"

"Blissfully," Linden smiles, his good ole' boyish cheeriness returning. Peri has a hard time remembering that he is fourteen, only, as he in some ways is beyond maturity, and can be even more mature than she is. Peri is incapable of trying to compare cancer to homelessness, but she has the security in having parents, and only recently having the leukemia diagnosis, meanwhile her district partner has been on his own for far too long, suffering from rapists and prostitutes, being left out in the rain, starvation, not going without showering... and she wants to complain about _her_ dying.

She is incapable of keeping the façade up, the two of them are smart enough. Peri searches for their axe blades, which they must've not brought with them down next to the oak tree. One of the blades glints off of the bright beams of sunlight, sitting in a field of daisies, and she rushes to grab them. Hers is a bit lighter than his, since even with the strength serum that is surely not going to last forever, he has some sort of strength that must be genetic, and with good practice, too... and she hands him his weapon, hers still slick with Rochelle's blood. That was five days ago, and Peri cannot stop thinking about that every single instance she looks at her weapon.

Peri sits down onto the daisy field. There are five tributes left, as the anthem interrupted them mid-coitus, which had been embarrassing to say the least. "Linden..." she closes her eyes. Acceptance of a wrong is the hardest thing to do, and she should know that. She had denied herself her demise for far too long. "We shouldn't have done that. We shouldn't have-"

"I know, and I agree," he sits next to her, placing a hand on her knee. Peri has to dig her heels into the dirt so she does not flinch; the contact is hardly intimate, but after all they do and did, how can she not think of his touch in that way? Linden sighs, and it sounds upset, but there's a wide smile on his face. "However, I am glad we did it," Linden says. "I am glad you showed me. I think I did need to see."

"Good, then," Peri speaks with finality, getting up, hands scuffing the dirt, digging into the ground with her heels. "Good."

He frowns, looking at her. She stands, stepping away some and moving a bit further down the hill. They've spent four whole days on this hill, throwing their axes at wooden dummies, and sleeping under the oak tree. They haven't seen a single other person, they haven't spoken to anyone else but themselves, and besides Rochelle, after the bloodbath, zero tribute contact. She wants to move off of this damn hill. The view of the arena is beautiful, and far away, but it is time to go elsewhere, it is time to move beyond comfort. Perhaps not tonight, but tomorrow, definitely.

"Peri, what's wrong?" he asks, stepping up and following her, standing away gingerly. She is reminded of the time he confronts her on the decision to kill Rochelle, where they are climbing said hill and she is behind him cautiously. That is he and hers relationship, an infinity circle, a wrap around, a time loop where each event mirrors one another. She never even talks about saving his life against Marcus, only that he is enraged... and maybe not even grateful. "It's all on your face. You didn't sleep well, did you?"

She scratches the back of her neck, hoping to break the scab that is there. "No," she says. "I slept horribly," Peri turns back around, hugging herself. "I dreamt of my parents. I-" the sound stops, and Peri shakes her head. This is not the time to be vulnerable, not any longer, not anymore, when the stakes are the highest they've ever been.

Linden, keeping the frown on his face, shrugs his shoulders. "I'm here if you want to talk about it. You can't keep everything bottled inside of you."

" _Oh yes I can,_ " her mind thinks sardonically, almost sneering at her district partner. Peri does not want to create more conflict than what they have already gone through, and she knows deep down that sleeping with him is not going to help mend any divide, but only further it, weather it down more as if their relationship was sandstone. "I don't want to talk about the dream, Linden. I just don't want to."

He sits down a bit farther on the hill, so they can overlook their favorite spot of the arena, where it reaches the sea, as he's never seen the ocean, and Peri remembers a class when she's younger about water and all of that. "I don't remember much about my mom," he says, after a pause, his voice heavy. "But I shared what I could remember with you, because I felt comfortable," he looks at her, and a pang of guilt races through her, like a zap of electricity. "Can you tell me about your parents?"

She doesn't want to.

He and her have gotten close, but she does not want to share anything with Linden about her family.

Nothing.

Peri sits next to him, trying to not sit on a ladybug, and decides that what she wants to do is not what is best for her. "My mom and dad are sweet people, working people..." she sighs. "And they're weak people." Linden looks over at her, lips pursed, but he does not say anything, although there is a slight sense of objectified horror in his eyes. "When I got diagnosed," Peri places a hand up against her side, running fingers over her ribs, feeling the valleys and trenches of flesh in between the bone. "They shut down. The reason why I hate pity is because of them, because of my parents. They couldn't stop crying that they were losing their baby girl, but people move on, and I came to terms with the fact I could go at any moment..." her voice becomes alarmingly quiet. "On the morning of the reaping, my mom bought me a literal, beautiful white dress for me to wear. A wedding dress," Peri's voice cracks. "It was beautiful, and I looked like a bride, but I told my mother that it was a wedding to death, that I was going to get married to death, to dress me up before I'd die..." she wipes at her eyes.

The amount of pain she has cost her family, in these last few months... Peri just hopes they could forgive her when the time came, whether it be she died tonight, or she became a victor and died thirty years later.

"My father isn't a lumberjack, like you'd expect," she cracks a brief smile, but it feels fake to her. If the feeling is fake to Peri, why perform it? "He is the one in charge of the water refinery for our section of District 7, to make sure we have clean water," and Linden's face is at an impasse, another pang running through her. Linden hasn't probably had fresh drinking water for who knows how long before arriving in the Capitol. "My mom is an economist, or she thinks she is. She's a seamstress..." Peri places a hand to her chest, grabbing at her breasts. "Neither job prepares them for the fact they're going to lose a daughter," she shakes her head. "I cried all I needed to after I was diagnosed. People would come by and give me gifts, since some days it hurt too much to even move down the stairs. Bread baskets, bouquets of flowers, fruit concoctions... towels, dresses, shoes and socks... all these gifts that filled our house to remind my parents that I was dying," Peri feels a lone tear slide down her cheek.

No pity.

 _No pity._

Linden pulls the girl close to him in a hug. "Well, Peri, whatever may be going on in your life, just know your parents are proud of you. I am sure they'll always love you, too," his voice sounds severely strained, as if he is trying to hold back tears.

"Thanks, Linden," Peri murmurs into the crook of his elbow. "Thank you."

She doesn't believe a word he says.

She doesn't believe a single word _she_ says either.

Her parents wouldn't be proud of a would-be killer.

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

She is insane.

She is batshit insane, and Valencia knows it. She knows it. She knows it so well that the arena is telling her that she is insane, for thinking she can break the mold, thinking she can do more than any other female from District 1, or do more than any other Career before her has done.

Valencia knows that everyone watching her at home. Her parents, her peers, the bullies she never liked, and above all, Kevia and Lance in the Viewing Center, all wondering what the hell is wrong with her. Where did she go wrong? Did they train her incorrectly? Was it something they said? Valencia isn't sure, but she knows she isn't insane. She's just frustrated. Maisey was insane; she isn't.

The girl from District 1 is standing in front of the Hall of Mystery, the map clutched in her hand. She needs to know what is in the unknown zone of the arena, she has to find out, otherwise it'll absolutely devastate her. The Careers are over, and she ended them on her own terms, not through some massive fight, not through half of them dying and then being torn apart at the seams, but because she decided to. That is why there hasn't been a Career victor in some time, as the paranoia would reach too high, the stakes would become too much for some handle, the stress levels reached their peak, and someone tightened their grip on their weapon, which sent the ensuing argument and fight into a carnage, between two sides, and the survivors do not go away unscathed, sustaining injuries and needing to lick their wounds, succumbing to said wounds later on. That is not what this is.

In some way, she's done something out of the norm from the typical Career, where the alliance ends and breaks in bloodshot. She does not know why Milor and Carrion let her leave however, as nothing could have stopped them from ganging up on her and ending her then and there. She knows, now more than ever, with there only being five tributes alive at this point, that she can go and die in any moment, and it could've happened earlier, saying goodbye. Carrion, however, and she can see it, with the darkness looming over his body, is a ticking time bomb waiting to go off, where it'll explode and destroy all those in its path. He does not have long, and Valencia is not sticking around to see what happens with Hurricane Milor rushes through in his fury, eliminating and killing anyone who stands in his way.

She's grateful, though, now, for the opportunity to venture on to something absolutely insane. The map is in her hands, and she has now circled the gray area with the question mark a few times over, making sure she knows where her end goal is in mind. She does not know what she will find there, and that is what echoes to her from the dark, in the deep abyss, where she can hear a possible richness bemoaning for Valencia Shale. It could be nothing, and she has to bank on that possibility too. It could be nothing but a simple chest and a lock, and inside said chest, a pack of crackers. It could be the secret to everlasting life, too, a modern Fountain of Youth, a water that Valencia would die to drink from. Ever since she had been very little, watching the death and the destruction, she knew she could have that life, and while Valencia has a heart, she'll betray it once in awhile to achieve it.

"You can do it," she coaches herself, standing in place, starting to then jog, the backpack bouncing up and down, hitting her shoulders, sleeping bag rolled up and attached, sword in hand. "You can do it, you can do it, you can do it," Valencia takes a deep breath. "If you couldn't, you'd be back at camp with Milor and Carrion. You can do it."

The Hall of Mystery beckons to her menacingly, with its exposed hall, the pitch black entryway, and the smell of death that pours out. It is in there, where she fails, where she fails to see the red flags and feel the threat in the air that makes all of the hair on her arms stand on end. Valencia has to know what the Gamemakers are hiding, or otherwise it wouldn't be directed on the map; there'd be no reason to have it.

She thinks, momentarily, about walking alongside the lake like the party had suggested earlier, back then, way _back then_ \- God, it was four days ago this happened, and there were seven of them alive then, not _three_ \- but she is almost bursting at the seams to find out, and the walk around the lake is an extra hour and a half easy, let alone her finding another tribute on the way. Too much risk; no one left is going to stumble into a place as terrifying as the one out in front of her. All that is on her mind, alongside all the things she could have done or changed since rising from the darkness on her tribute plate, is that staircase she sees, from across said lake, where you could go through the hall, three days ago, and the mystery it contained. A chrome path, fancy lights, and an earthquake.

Valencia exhales a shaky breath out of her lungs, it riddled with sawdust and copper flecks, and she holds onto her sword a bit tighter than she ever has before, taking a step into the mouth of the serpent, into the lion's jaws, and her body trembles, crossing the threshold of concrete to carpet.

It is the same hallway like before, where it is fifteen degrees colder inside than it is outside in the heat, but it is all her this time, a lone Shale, a lone Career in the world. She looks behind her, for a brief second, picturing what the team had looked like beforehand, before bringing them into the fire. Milor's determination, he following right behind her, his own sword drawn, and Carrion armed with a spearhead, clinging to his boyfriend. Marcus behind the two other boys, and Valencia is struggling to remember what his face looked like. Did he have tears down his face? Was he crying? Did he plan right then and there, stepping into the building, what his betrayal would entail? Hero had been next, the most nervous out of all of them, with his wide eyes, tender face, soft expressions, looking around wildly at the amaranthine carpet, and the pictures on the wall. Maisey follows, with her smirk, with her constantly ticked off look, holding onto Persephone's arm, the beautiful girl trying to save face, trying to brave the darkness in front of her.

The pictures are all gone, Valencia notices, as she looks forward towards the hallway again, which led into the mirror maze. She notices as well that it is also silent, as if the siren's song has been ceased, and the birds all flew home. The drum beat from earlier has vanished, and all she hears is the sounds of her footsteps digging into the soft ground, her sword occasionally slicing off of the wall.

Valencia steps into the center of the mirror maze, where the true end of the Careers began, and chokes out a silent sob, holding the noise in her throat. She might be alone, but she isn't _alone._ It happened right here, right here did the Careers fall, through betrayal and backstabbing and blood. The bodies are gone - Valencia does not know what she will do if she finds a corpse; she's never puked in her life - but the blood remains.

She oversteps one large puddle, absolutely massive one, by the entrance way, it looking like there had been a body laid on its side, and someone kneeling in front of the body. _Hero and Maisey._ Valencia had never been close to the girl from Four - she'll be honest, she downright despised the blonde nut - but she didn't deserve to die like that, in a dark place, out of nowhere, in a pained moment. Valencia does not see Hero die, she having been curled up into the fetal position in the corner, where ahead, if she glances up, she can see that crook, a perfect crook where all the lights would have landed. She does not see Hero die, but he hears her, and his screams for Victoria, for his district partner... they're sounds she'll never be able to get out of her head.

Looking ahead, Valencia can see that most of the mirror maze is still intact, only the dredges of Carrion and Marcus's fight are there and broken, and she has half of the maze to traverse. There are no lasers, no darkness for her to muddle through, since all the emergency lights are on, but the hair on Valencia's arm still rises up on end.

The girl shoves some broken glass out of the way with the tip of her sword, looking at all the broken mirrors that still stand up in half jagged ridges, she losing the ability to catch her breath. Hearing from Carrion what happened is one thing, but _seeing_ is another. A sob this time escapes her throat, when she looks to the right, and a piece of glass immediately catches her eye. Valencia takes a cautious step up to it, and a ball forms in her throat. It is a single piece from a shattered mirror, drenched in crimson, almost a charcoal color. _Marcus._

Carrion does not leave much detail out when he describes around the campfire that night of how he throws Marcus, after breaking both hands of his, onto the shard of glass that goes up through his jaw, and then how the Career forced the enemy down onto it out through the back of the head.

Valencia feels the warmness and heat of tears rushing to her cheeks, spilling out of the ducts. "I'm sorry Maisey..." she sobs. "I'm sorry, Hero. I'm sorry Marcus, I'm so sorry..." and she has to sink to her knees. "I'm so sorry Persephone..." she croaks, unable to catch her breath. "I failed all of you. I- I am so sorry..."

She struggles to her feet, needing to catch her breath. This wasn't a good idea, and the seeds of regret are starting to be planted in her head, growing gorgeous violets and rose petals. Valencia straightens her back, shoulders down and relaxed. She has gotten through the hardest part, and now she just has to go through the beyond, break every damn mirror in the place. She opens her eyes after momentarily closing them and screams.

"Why, Valencia, you look as if you've seen a ghost," someone says, and she screams again, lifting her sword in terror.

Marcus Pharadane, her district partner, stares back at her from a mirror ahead of her in the maze. She widens her eyes, heart roaring in her chest. What- what _is?_ No... that's not- that's not possible; he's- he's dead, he's dead and gone and can't hurt her and what the hell? Valencia keeps her sword up, hands shaking, but what this ghost won't know won't hurt her. "You- you're dead..." her voice comes out a whole lot less confident than she'd like.

He tilts his head, stepping forward _out of the mirror,_ causing her to elicit a shriek, slashing wildly with her weapon in a silver arc. "Am I, Valencia? Am I really dead? Did I really die?" Marcus lifts his neck up, and Valencia has to hold in the bile that wants to spew out of her mouth. There's a gaping hole underneath the boy's jaw, the flesh corroded and blackened, blood dripping out of it. When Marcus smiles at her, his teeth are stained a cherry red.

"Carrion threw you onto a piece of glass. It went through your head!"

"I guess you can say I am full of surprises, aren't I?" Marcus cocks his head again, eyes glinting an obsidian black. Wait a minute...? Through her terror, Valencia frowns. Marcus Pharadane does not have dark eyes. His were brown, his were brown, not black, not obsidian. "I can't say the same thing about you," he breaks off another shard of glass, clenching it in his hand. He groans out in pain, from the glass tearing his hand to shreds, golden blood - _ichor,_ Valencia remembers what it is called - spilling out onto the ground.

"I- I don't know what-" Valencia tries speaking, but her voice is too broken, the reverb cracks in several places, and she is back to when she's eight years old, the Rottweiler above her snarling, foam spilling out of the dog's mouth, about to rip her throat to shreds, and Valencia is so terrified she can't even cry out for help.

"Look around you," Marcus opens his hands wide, gesturing around him. "We all died here. Me, Hero, Maisey... your confidence," his eyes aglow with malice. "You led us into the lion's jaws and watched us die, and all you did was cower in the corner and scream," his face turns into a snarl. "You ruined the Careers, you ruined yourself. You're pathetic! Valencia Shale, the girl who was supposed to win the Hunger Games, destined for victory, crying in a corner!" Valencia is speechless, unable to defend herself, arms shaking, the sword nearly falling onto the floor and out of her grip. "You're the girl who couldn't fight a nobody from District 9..." Marcus taunts.

She lets go of her sword, falling onto her butt, scooting back on the floor into a mirror. "Stop- stop it..." Valencia begs, placing her hands over her ears.

Marcus advances on her, his head moving around like a snake. "You're the girl who's parents don't love. You're the girl who never proved you were top dog to anyone else in the alliance," he crouches down next to her, placing a hand on her shoulder, and it _feels_ so real, Valencia shuddering, starting to shake her head back and forth, tears free flowing now. "You're the girl who had the foolish dreams of becoming a victor and doing something in the Career alliance that no one had ever done before. You were wrong!" he roars in her face. "You're just a normal girl! You're the girl that loved someone else but couldn't do anything in return for her. You're a failure! A failure!"

"Please stop!" she yells, but he won't listen.

"Failure! Failure! Failure! Failure!" Marcus continues chanting, towering over her, marching around Valencia in a circle, screaming the insult.

"Get out of my head!" Valencia screams.

"The girl who let Hero die! The girl who let Maisey die! The girl who let _me_ die! The girl who let Persephone die! She died and you did nothing! Persephone was burnt alive and you did nothing! Failure, Valencia! You will never amount to anything; you'll die just like Persephone did!"

"I said get out of my head!" she screams again, at the top of her lungs, and she opens her eyes, removing the hands over her ears, reaching for her sword in arms distance, and slicing outwards.

The apparition of Marcus's ghost vanishes, sliced in half, the ghost that had never been there, his voice dying away, and Valencia is left all alone, he disappearing into a pillar of salt.

Valencia swallows her fear, getting to her feet shakily. It is Persephone. Her Persephone...

Milor was right... _is right_.

She loved her.

Valencia takes one more look in the Hall of Mystery, and flees for her life, her dead district partner's words hanging on the air, brewing vengeance in her veins.

* * *

 ** _Linden Hazel: District 7 Male P.O.V (14)_**

* * *

"Ladies and gentlemen, tributes, may I have your attention. In one hour, as per the rules of the Quarter Quell, will be another tribute vote-off," comes the voice of Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis, Linden's head perking up from his nap, elsewhere in the arena, booming over the comm. "Likewise, as before, each of you will be send via a sponsor parachute, a piece of paper and a writing instrument," a bit ahead of him, Peri, who is awake, snorts. _Writing instrument?_ Must they be so eloquent? "Within the hour, you must write the name of the tribute you wish to cast your vote for. You cannot look at who anyone else is writing down as their vote, or otherwise that'll be a vote cast in your name instead. There are five of you left, and all five of you are eligible as names to write down," Linden has no idea why anyone would think of voting for themselves this late in the game. If they made the Top Five tributes, they could more or less win the whole damned thing. "If you end up not deciding to vote, one will be thrown for your name in its place as well. The tribute with the most votes dies. Who that is depends on your vote. How they die will not be disclosed. The tribute death will be revealed at midnight, along with the tallied number of votes for each tribute," a pause on the other end, a coughing coming from Lewlyn, "Happy Hunger Games, and may the odds be ever in your favor..."

With a trumpet fanfare that is louder than anything in the damn world that Linden has ever heard, Lewlyn's voice dissipates into thin air like water breaking over a rock. The vote-off from before had been at the end of Night One, hadn't it? He and Peri, if he can recall, voted together and chose Victoria as the tribute to die, and when six whole votes out of eighteen, one third of the tribute body, had been for her, a rock sinks into his stomach. He should have voted for someone that would not have been considered on that list, like Edwin, or... well, anyone else other than a Career.

He recalls seeing a vote for him, unless he is misremembering information, that of course having been an anonymous reveal. Linden still doesn't know whether to feel proud that someone views - or viewed, truthfully, the person who voted for him might be dead - him to be strong enough as a threat that needs to be eliminated or duly terrified that he had been considered on the chopping block. With him and Peri left, and three Careers, either one of them could die, unless... _unless..._

Peri scoots closer to him, they having been staring at the stars, she petting his hair, he braiding and unbraiding it over and over again, making fishtail braids and unraveling them. "You nervous?"

"A bit," he admits, chewing on the inside of his lip.

"Why?"

"Weren't you and I both on the list last time? Someone had voted for us?"

She frowns. "I'm not sure. I know it is us and three Careers tonight."

"So one of us could die," Linden says it before he even thinks about what he is saying, and the words taste like acid when they spill out of his mouth, foreign and something that shouldn't be there. He remembers one of the memories from his mother had been her always telling him to say what is on his mind and how he felt, embracing her like hugging onto a warm piece of kindle. "One of us could die, tonight, Peri. If the Careers are all still together, I guarantee you they're all going to vote for either you or I."

Peri stands up, dragging her axe with her, back out from under the oak tree. "Maybe. It's come across my mind, before," she says.

"And you aren't worried?" Linden frowns, not understanding her angle. The calmness his district partner is exuding is not calming him down. For the first time, for the first real time in the arena, since he's been trapped in a death bowl, the actual ability to die is in front of him. Had Peri never revealed the fact to Marcus, who surely revealed that truth to the Careers, that she had been gifted with some bough of strength, he'd for sure be the one getting ripped apart by a pack of mutts, for the Careers knew about his strength. He even managed to score high enough on the level of Carrion.

Linden begins to sweat.

"Showing my worry and anxiety won't make it any better," Peri chews on the inside of her cheek, facing him. "Linden, besides... I've learned long ago to embrace my possible death. If it happens tonight, it happens tonight. If it doesn't, then I get to fight another day and try to live." He wants her confidence. He wants her _everything._

Her touch is gentle on his back, the way she grinds her hips against his, and how she is not rough, like the other woman, the woman whose name Linden cannot even remember. Her hair smells of strawberries and industrial smoke, her lips chapped and cracked, smelling like death and her body reeks of ginger and clover and cancer cells, where the skin drapes off of her like curtains. However, as he is lying on his back, looking up at her, trying to remember to breathe, when her body blocks the sun pouring down onto them, for the second she's covered in shadows, Linden has to catch his breath.

Peri is gorgeous.

She is everything the prostitute had not been.

Ambitious. Passionate. Pretty. Beautiful. Ethereal. Linden used to believe his mother had been the most beautiful woman to ever exist on the face of Planet Earth, but the moment he meets sixteen year-old Peri Florence on the train ride to the Capitol, probably smelling like the latest pig sty he had slept in, his world spins counter-clockwise, and he sees supernovas explode behind closed eyes.

He is not ready to lose her.

He is not ready to make it home over her, when he plunges the knife into her heart, when they're the final two and have taken on the whole world. The angel on his left shoulder still sits there trying to beg he commit a self-sacrifice, but the demon who speaks more rationally speaks of a home for himself, where he can get a new mother, have brothers and sisters, have the ability to enact revenge on his father who abandoned him when he is younger for a more attractive woman.

How can he make that decision when he looks over at her?

Linden's mind is clouded, and so is his heart. Now that he's seen, _seen_ her, he can just forget about having an answer.

Peri runs a hand through the bit of hair that has started to grow back. "We're going to vote similarly again, right? We did last time, didn't we?"

"If- if you want," Linden answers truthfully. "I think it'll better help our chances of surviving." This is weird to him, discussing the death of others he has gotten semi-close to. He only watches the Careers from a distance, but he doesn't hate any of them. He isn't jealous of their life, he isn't wanting to be them... he just knows they must die in order for him to live.

"Who, then? Not us, I imagine," she asks.

"One of the Careers, of course."

"I was thinking Milor, since I know he and Carrion are sewn at the hip, but then... well..." Peri drawls out the sentence, looking at Linden, who only stares back at her blankly, not filling in the rest. "Valencia, under Victoria, had three votes against her. Right?"

"Yeah, you're right," he nods his head, but not understanding the gist of Peri's point. "So?"

Peri rolls her eyes. "She is the highest scoring tribute in the entire pack. She is also a Career, which means she is her allies biggest competition too, and that's if the group is still together, since we're down to the final five. They might've broken when Maisey, Hero, and Marcus we're all shown, or maybe when Persephone fell and that was the aftermath," she grabs Linden's hands in her own, eyes bright. "The point I am making is that they're divided, and they might not think alike and vote for either one of us... what if just one of them voted for each other? Or they were split, wanting to vote for you or I and they can't come to a consensus?"

"Chance," Linden speaks a moment after allowing his thoughts to catch up to speed. "You want to put our survivability up to _chance?_ "

"It's one I am willing to take."

He bites down on his lip. All Linden has ever wanted to do is live his life, whether that be with a mother and a father who love him. Whether it be in a mansion, a one room house, or next to a cow pen... he has wanted to live his life happily, and positively, not sitting on a daisy field eating strawberries, sleeping with an ally of his, and deciding who to kill with a random sheet of paper.

The parachute announces its arrival a few seconds later, he not having said anything. It lands in his hands, heavy, out of place, the slip of paper and pen hanging onto it via a thread. Linden unwinds the thread the instruments are hanging onto, holding both objects in each hand, staring at them, Peri looking at him expectantly over the hill, her hair illuminated by the moonlight, while she dies on the inside, able to keel over at any moment.

The time is now, and Linden is out of time.

It is time he grows up and takes the next step.

He closes his eyes, and he leaps, not knowing where he'll land or how far he has to fall.

* * *

 ** _Milor Drusus: District 2 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

He and Carrion are in mutual agreement on who they are voting for, having discussed it. The pen is heavy in his hands, as if he is holding onto his sword instead of a simple ink creating little machine. His boyfriend is sitting directly across from him, the two having never moved from the little bench and shop that they had awoken under, and the aura and feel around their little camp is no different with Valencia gone.

Milor can see the whiteness and paleness on Carrion's face, the paleness that might not have been there yesterday, or the struggle to breathe... he hears it all, but if he doesn't say anything about it, or draw attention to it, it will all go away, it will all go away and Carrion will be healed. They can pray to a sponsor to send healing cream, some magical potion that'll immediately make his boyfriend feel better, the only person in the entire Capitol and in all of District 2 that understands Milor for who he is as a person... Persephone could never do that.

Tomorrow, after the vote-off, when it is them two and two others left, whether it be Valencia, Peri, or Linden, he is going out there. He's killed Marissa and he has killed Colt, two tributes who are unprepared in the art of defense, one an idiot, the other who had lost their mind and there had been zero struggle. As evil as it may sound, Milor wants a fight, to fight someone who could push back and give him the adrenaline rush that he has always wanted. All of his training to become a Career will not mean anything after he is victor, with Carrion by his side. If he wins the Hunger Games by stabbing a girl who couldn't hear no, and slitting the throat of a boy who lost his mind, Milor is not able to say he'll take the victory with grace.

He needs to work for his win, and that means spilling blood. Being the man his father has always told him to be, removing the homosexuality out of the equation: Milor has been trained to be a fighter.

"Ready?" Carrion asks, breaking Milor out of his stupor, gently rubbing his hand over one of Milor's, fingertips soothing scars and knuckles. His boyfriend has been non-stop sweating since Valencia left, but Milor cannot feel anything wrong with him, and Carrion declares he's fine, but Milor can't get the nagging in the back of his head to vanish... Carrion's sick, and unless the two win the Games sooner than later, he might not be around for much longer.

"Ready," Milor nods his head.

Another trumpet fanfare plays, but there is no announcement for Lewlyn this time. A holographic screen appears above them, far above in the clouds, wide enough for them to see. It has five pictures lined up by district order, Milor seeing his own face looking back at him, the profile picture the Capitol has them take on the first day of training, using said view for the revealing of the tribute scores, and now as their faces when they're shone in the sky. A second table of five rows is next to each picture, indicating the area where the tallies will go.

Carrion squeezes Milor's hand again, and the two boys get to writing.

It is a quick swish of the pen, one simple name and it is done, all taken care for, and Carrion follows suit. Milor closes the cap on the pen, rolling it over to the side. It doesn't matter who anyone else votes for, since he's safe, he knows it deep down that no one would be actually stupid enough to vote for Milor Drusus; it'd mean their death. He turns the piece of flimsy paper up to the sky, the name written in black ink.

 _Linden Hazel_

Carrion's vote is for Linden as well. Milor knows that Peri is still dying of leukemia, and with Valencia out in the arena somewhere, being the golden child, the representative of the Games as the highest scoring, and a Career, it is a match well worth it for him and his training. It has been way too long since there had been a Career showdown one versus one fight to determine the victor of the Hunger Games. Valencia could not even fight Blake Hanley, a guy from District 9 who had as much personality as a log, and if she is supposed to be some excellently trained fighter, who nearly loses to a guy with zero training whatsoever, she'd never be a match for him.

That leaves little Linden Hazel as the de-facto person to throw the blame onto, to throw the vote onto. Someone who isn't a real challenge, although certainly impressive to score so high at such a young age.

The tallies appear next to the people's names, Carrion flipping his piece of paper over to the cameras as well.

Milor sucks in a breath, holding onto it until his head begins to hurt. The tallies were as follows,

 _Valencia - I I_

 _Milor -_

 _Carrion -_

 _Peri - I_

 _Linden - I I_

A two-way tie between Valencia and Linden, a tie-breaker, something would have to be decided against who that tie was.

Milor frowns. It must've been District 7 who voted for Valencia, and Valencia who voted for Peri. Perhaps Valencia wants a win that is well-earned, just like his.

"So that's that, then," Carrion sucks in a breath, holding onto Milor for support as he gets to his feet. "No one voted for us, either, just like last time..." a smile dances on the boy's lips, and he draws Milor towards him in a kiss. "We can do this, Milor. You and I can win this and both of us can go home..."

He finishes out the kiss, biting onto Carrion's lower lip once more, dragging the skin with him. "It's a shame... either Valencia or Linden," he says rather sadly, tone drooping with melancholy. "If Valencia goes, it'll be a shame. I wanted to see the look on her face when I bested her in a fight..."

Milor turns his back to the screen, not caring anymore what the outcome is. He recalls hearing that a vote would be cast for one of the two tributes, to break the tie, that the decision would be at random between the two of who'd go, a fifty-fifty chance between Linden and Valencia, and that sucks. It sucks when Milor watches Victoria get snatched in the middle of the night by some beast, since he lost an ally he had sought after that day, but it just meant he didn't have to kill her, or that she didn't die trapped in that mirror maze like the rest of them.

However, he does not notice Carrion's face go stark pale, almost crying out in shock. He does not see the way the holographic screen seems to glitch like mad, and then new results are displayed... four tallies, except his own, all next to his name, so it looked like _Milor - I I I I_

He does not notice, with his back turned, a turret rise out of the bushes, a long, elongated dart-looking machine extend from the greenery.

"Milor!" Carrion spits out, exerting all of his force and vaulting forward, colliding into him.

Milor loses his footing, crying out in surprise, falling down onto the concrete. A few seconds later, there's the sound of machinegun fire, something Milor is used to after watching Peacekeepers gun down protest.

He covers his ears at the overbearing roar - it sounds so much closer than he expects... were Valencia or Linden close by? - and only raises his head when the noise stops, looking over at Carrion, and then his heart stops.

Carrion looks down at his body, peppered with bullet holes, blood pouring out of every orifice, out of every hole in his chest, standing in the spot Milor had once been standing in. Had- had Carrion not pushed him, he would've... he would've-

The boy from Four collapses onto the sidewalk, all the energy exerted in the push unable to keep him standing any longer, he falling back. Milor screams his boyfriend's name, rushing towards him, grabbing his hand.

It's too much blood. It's way too much blood; Milor has never seen someone leak this much blood before. No.. no it doesn't make any sense, it doesn't make any sense! It is supposed to be Valencia or Linden dying! Not- not Carrion!

"Carrion!" Milor yells, trying to prop his body up, hands streaming with scarlet. "No, you can't- you can't do this to me, baby. You can't give out on me now, we've got a Hunger Games to win. You- you said it yourself sweetheart. Don't die on me, Carrion, don't die on me."

The boy gives him a blood-stained smile, his fingers coated in the copper river of life, and he lifts a shaky hand up to Milor's cheek, drawing a heart in blood on the flesh. "I am yours... and you are mine..." Carrion exhales, in pain, his body hurting and overwhelmed with the mark of death. His head lolls back onto the ground, eyes staring out into the distance.

Milor clutches onto Carrion, rocking back and forth. "No. I can't do this alone. You- no... stay with me, Carrion. Stay with me, you gotta stay awake. We got a Hunger Games to win together..." he shakes his boyfriend's unresponsive body. "Carrion... Carrion! Carrion! Carrion! Carrion!" Milor cannot stop repeating the boy from Four's name, over and over and over and over again.

It is the sound of the cannon that finalizes it.

It is the sound of the cannon that means Carrion Bastion has passed.

He feels the tears pour out of his eyes before he can help it, Milor's mouth wide and open as he unleashes a silent scream, holding Carrion's body to his chest, covering himself in blood.

The final five are reduced to the final four.

* * *

 **5th: Carrion Bastion, 18, District 4 Male. Killed by the tribute-vote-off aftermath. Created by 20. I have to wipe the tears away from my eyes. Wow, umm, what to say about Carrion? I'll be honest, I loved him from the very first moment he was given to me, having been a swap out of a different D4 male Santiago created. You all put him on the dislike and hate list early on, before getting to know him, and then he grew on you, like all the rest, and now he's gone, in the face of the Capitol meddling, and he dies saving the man he loved. Carrion was one of my favorites, ladies and gentlemen, like all the tributes that made up this Top 5, but one of them needed to go, and I had this event planned in the back of my mind for the longest time... Carrion Bastion, may no one ever forget you. You were amazing, and I will miss writing you.**

* * *

 ** _Tribute List (Boy - Girl)_**

District 1: **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 2: **Milor Drusus** [ _Submitted by Alecxias_ ]

District 7: **Linden Hazel** [ _Submitted by Keadon_ ] / **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #41: Vengeance In Our Veins. I will also now duck and dodge all the rotten food thrown at me, because I can only imagine how many of you are pissed off over this death. I will be up front and clear with you, I had planned some sort of Capitol tampering with a Quell twist in a story ever since I thought of SYOT ideas, and this one is a perfect set-up... because what happens when there's a tie for the vote-off? Yes, had this been any other round, Valencia or Linden would have been the one to go via a random RNG vote, but instead, since we had Bonnie in the previous chapter beg Calhoun to do something like rig, I decided to extend the vote to all five tributes at random and it selected Milor. However, I had it written for their arcs, that if Milor were selected to die via the RNG vote, Carrion would take it instead, and at this stage, this far into the Games, with his wounds, it was looking like Carrion wasn't coming out on top, but now, it is anyone's game, and we know Milor isn't taking this one sitting down.**

 **Beyond that, we have reached the final four: two Careers and District 7, who have been proven to be rather steadfast. The next _three_ \- yes, you're reading me right - chapters are Capitol point of view chapters, which I had originally thought about being one massive chapter, but since I want to reach arena stages as quick as possible, these three Capitol chapters will have two points of view each, pushing along their plot, and we'll return to the arena with Chapter #45: Four Souls to Die, as the end of the arena is upon us very quickly ladies and gentlemen.**

 **There are four tributes left now, sixteen possible combinations for the finale. What are your top two cage match picks (A v B), and then who do you see becoming victor, at this late stage in the game? I might say, how we go out - victor is still undecided, I'll be honest, I'm balancing three characters in my head - will surprise you, if this chapter has been any indicator.**

 **I hope you all read and review and share your thoughts, whether they be angry, happy, constructive and what-not. I will see you all soon with Chapter #42: The Hornet's Nest, and soon we'll also be back in the arena at Chapter #45: Four Souls to Die. I love you all so much, and I hope to have you here with me when we're reaching the end, that is so close I can taste it. You all have an amazing day! Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	42. The Hornet's Nest (Capitol Plot XII)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #42: The Hornet's Nest, and I am oh so very excited for this one, because it means we are super close to the end, we are eight chapters away from the very, very end, and guys, I am bursting with excitement. This will be another leg of the Capitol OC storyline, as will the chapter after this, but we have reached our final four tributes in Valencia, Milor, Peri, and Linden, and there is so much more drama to be had; I cannot wait to actually be finished with my own SYOT, and it looks like I may be ambling to having the longest written SYOT in the archive's history, at least when comparing chapter versus word count ratio, but I digress. Enjoy Chapter #42: The Hornet's Nest.**

* * *

 ** _Lance Viel: Victor of the 79th Hunger Games_**

* * *

He is enjoying his mornings well enough, as good as he can, until someone comes onto his floor, raging hell, throwing things around and screaming obscenities. Lance's eyes snap awake in fright, he rubbing his eyes and looking at the clock. It is somewhere around 8:15 AM, and he just wants his damn sleep. However, the noise is becoming tiresome, when there's a loud crash, the scurrying of feet, and he throws the covers off.

"I just want some sleep..." he grumbles to himself, bare feet touching the cold wooden floor beneath him, chills lacing up his body, a sheen cold covering his entire body. Lance rubs his arms, sticking his head out into the hallway. An avox is on their knees on the floor, picking up shards of a pot that shattered and placing them in another Avox's hands standing right by them. A bit further, another avox pushes someone back that Lance can't see, they blocked by the wall frame while he blearily steps into the foyer. Lance yawns, hair slicked up with bedhead, and he looks across the hallway to Kevia's room.

Her door is wide open, bathroom light off. He frowns. Kevia's already gone? Lance knows that Valencia is the only one for District 1 alive, and her tribute, but Kevia has never gotten up earlier than ten or eleven in the morning for anything, not even when it is her tribute in the top two; Valencia still has to survive to make that stage. If it isn't Kevia the avox is keeping from stepping forward, then who...?

Lance turns into the main section of the floor, and he sees Hale Cornerstone, troublemaker extraordinaire, hands on her hips, constantly trying to push past the avox, to go help the others on the floor to pick up the plant. "Hale?" he says with surprise lacing the syllables. "What are you-" he cuts himself off, attention going to those cleaning up the mess. The avox who is dusting through the shards catches his eye first, red streams that are brighter and thicker than their outfit running down their hands and onto the tile. They're bleeding. The avox is bleeding from the face and from the hands and-

He runs over to them, crouching down next to the avox. "You're bleeding," Lance says, rather stupidly. He's sure the avox is sure they know they're bleeding; great observation skills there. The victor tries nudging the avox out of the way. "Let me get this. You're hurt."

Likewise with Hale's situation, Lance is shoved out of the way by the Avoxes, both of those dealing with the pot. "Let me past; they need my help," Hale argues again, the third Avox's hands gentle on her shoulders, and the girl's face distorting in visible anger, but Lance can see the realization on her face begin to dawn. Hale is much stronger than anyone in this room, as Lance is discovering with burdensome age and back, and if she wishes to move by on her own accord, there could be more than just cut hands occurring.

The victor from One gets back to his feet, stepping back and closer to the kitchen counter, the marble counter in which his elbows rest up against. Hale gives up another two tries, and relief washes over said Avox's face, their eyebrows drooping together. Lance cannot stop looking at the puddle of blood on the floor. His district partner's looked like that, with the throat slit as she writhes around in her death throes, and he can't stops screaming, he can't run away, the knife is in him, oh it hurts, _oh it hurts..._

"It's how they are..." he says quietly, when Hale moves over to him. "It's how they're conditioned. To do everything themselves, no outside help, or otherwise they're punished."

"It's sad," Hale echoes, her voice awkwardly distant, as if she is speaking to him from across the room and he can hardly hear her.

"You would think with Calhoun's more benevolent heart, he'd have learned to no longer keep these sort of things in Panem. If Lewlyn can do it with her brother, then surely..." he trails off, as all the Avoxes in the room perk up slightly - but not done in a manner to show true interest - at the mentioning of Rennie, freedom, and more, the treasonous thoughts filling the room. The pot has been all cleaned up, the shards thrown away, and the injured avox gets to their feet, wiping their hands on their shirt, red meshing into red, and Lance still cannot wipe out his ledger. They vanish back to their corners, to act as if they do not exist. "What happened? What are you even doing here this early?"

Hale steps away from the counter, wiping her hands off on her dress. "I came in out of the elevator and one of them was carrying the pot to be swapped out with another one, I guess, and me saying hello scared them, so they dropped the plant," she runs a hand through her hair. "The moment I rushed forward to help, one came out of nowhere and held me back..." she looks away, frowning. "I didn't want to hurt him, so I didn't force myself past," Hale sighs deeply, hanging her head back, ponytail drifting towards the floor, and she rights herself again. "So, good morning."

Lance looks at her with a raised eyebrow, and then realizes he's shirtless, and then remembers that she's married, and he's no Arizona Merviere so he needs to go and change into something presentable. He gets on a shirt quickly, and looks at the time. Still only 8:45, and he is never up this early either unless it is the Cornucopia or somewhere very important, like the first day in training. There better be a good reason why Hale is on his floor this early dropping unannounced, or Lance Viel swears on his mother's grave and his district partner's dead body he'll kick her out of the first story window and watch her plummet to the ground, skull splattering on the cobblestones.

He reenters the kitchen, Hale sitting down, looking rather dressed up, but he keeps on forgetting that they no longer need to present themselves to the Viewing Room constantly, every hour of the day, unlike the others whose tributes are alive. Lance makes himself a cup of coffee, not adding any sugar to it. Sugar is artificial here, it is artificial in District 1, all of it processed, all of it _fake..._ and he has no way out of it. He cannot get the taste out of his teeth, where the globules get stuck in the corners, down into the roots, and the sweetness hits him in unexpected times, such as showering, or where brushing his teeth cannot remove the plasticity.

"Good morning," he says to her, cordially. Lance likes Hale, he can admit that, but he isn't sure to the extent of _where_ that goes, how far it can extend, and with her latest outbursts and current behavior, Lance feels awful that he has to even lower his opinion of her; she should be someone he has to admire too, as he most likely is to her, since they both won the Games after all, they both won and survived absolutely horrible atrocities. "You're all dressed up." He cannot remember the last time he wore something 'fancy' to the Viewing Center, if that is where she's even going, so seeing her gussied up in a short dress that exposes the shoulders, with makeup applied to her face... actually, he isn't even going to ask. "Going to the Viewing Center?"

"No," she shakes her head in dissent, picking a grape up out of a fresh bowl sitting on the other side of the counter. Hale bites into it, the juice dribbling down her chin, and Lance winces, feeling those same streaks in a darker color run down his face. "I have a date today. You?"

"I have to," he confesses. "As much as I'd love to stay here under the covers."

Another grape, and this time Hale breaks it apart with her pointer finger, poking through the skin of the fruit. A bit of the juice splatters elsewhere on the counter, and Lance turns away from it. The sound is a sizzle; blood doesn't sizzle, and it certainly doesn't taste sweet, when the blood pours down his face, over his ears, and fills his mouth until he's gagging, gagging, choking... he steadies onto the counter to hold himself.

"Where's Kevia?" Hale asks.

He shrugs. "She isn't here..." a slight pause from him, and Lance walks to the other side of the counter. "I think she left early, just in case she would run into you."

"Her loss, then," the victor from Two shrugs her shoulders likewise, her tone nonchalant, an odd chill crawling up his arms, and Lance's neck twitches. Her nonchalant tone... his skin is downright itching, and he wants to wrap his hands around her throat and squeeze, until those decadent eyes pop out of her head. "I came here to apologize before time got away from me."

Lance places a hand on the counter, tracing one of the stones sticking out in front of him. A pretty pearlescent color: flesh, pallor corpse light, a beam of the moon falling onto his knee; images of an arena and of an era where his heart beats just as fast as his step. "Do you have any idea what sort of damage you did two days ago? Any idea what problems you've caused with your outburst?"

Hale frowns, leering at him, and she goes for another grape. Could she even kill him with a grape? Maybe the bowl...

"What are you saying? That I shouldn't have gotten in her face about it?"

"Actually, yes," Lance scratches the back of his neck. "You put yourself on the front page of every Capitol magazine in the city. You went in guns ablazing, scaring Kevia half to death-" she opens her mouth to rebuttal, but he raises his hand, tutting his tongue. "Let me talk, Hale. You never let anyone else get a word in edge wise, please," she frowns at him, crossing her arms, and Lance is seriously considering that she is seriously considering killing him with the grape bowl. "Kevia is now afraid you are going to kill her, because you told her as much. Did you ever think about subtlety? Blackmail doesn't work with threats like that."

She finishes the grape she is slowly picking away at, tilting her head to the right slightly. He sees his old district partner in her, the woman that would've had a wonderful future ahead of her without being strangled, without the cold bite of the blade up against that milk and honey skin, where his kisses trail down her back, and create a buzz at the top of her skull. "You're going to criticize me? The same person who told me about the letter in the first place?"

"I didn't say to go after her, Hale."

"She threatened to betray me to Calhoun and Bonnie!" Hale yells. "What was I supposed to do? Let Kevia ruin my family, kill me? Kill Ari?"

Lance raises an eyebrow. _Ari..._ she doesn't even call him in Arizona. Can she even help it? Can she help keeping the secret under wraps? Lance remembers seeing them kiss once, underneath one of the stands as the tribute chariots go around and around and around, and he feels like he needs to bathe, having seen something he shouldn't have seen. Not to fraternize with the enemy. The other victors were the enemies, not the Capitol... _never the Capitol._

"I've been alive twelve years longer than you, Hale," he leans forward, closer to her. "I've won eight years before you, too. That means I've had eight years more experience than you at playing this game, at staying alive in the game. Here's the thing you don't understand, Hale," she scoffs at the mentioning of her name; he could care less if he is being patronizing or whatever the hell the word is; he's not some damn speaker. "For Calhoun, and Bonnie, and Lewlyn, and Pollux and all the rest of them... this is their life. It isn't a game to them because the Capitol is just lies and danger and more lies atop that..." he moves to touch her hand, but she skips away from him, looking at him up underneath her gaze, eyes hooded, almost dark. "We're fish out of water."

Hale swallows, locking her jaw, gaze staying over to the left. She taps her fingers onto the countertop, and out of the corner of his eye, Lance can see there's the tiniest piece of the pot still sitting on the floor, a white speck in a sea of brown. Maybe he can grab it before she notices, and he'll shove it into her eye... "You want me to be cordial with someone who tried to ruin me? I thought the victors, since we survived the arena, were all supposed to be one group? One voice? United against the tyranny here?"

"We're a hornet's nest," Lance stands up straight, taking the bowl of grapes from her. She didn't even ask. How inconsiderate.

She shakes her head, getting to her feet. "Then that's a shame."

"You know what's a shame?" Lance says, crossing his arms. She looks at him, one eyebrow piqued, to continue the statement. "That you're complaining. You struck the hornet's nest and you're complaining about being stung."

He does not want to have to continue swinging blindly, to getting stung in the dark.

They can all hang.

Hale Cornerstone most of all.

* * *

 ** _President of Panem Calhoun Rodney P.O.V_**

* * *

His hands have stayed like fists down by his sides the entire walk from the hospital labs to the Gamemaker Center. Some citizens stop to say hello, a reporter asking for a comment or two on some trivial matter like starving in the districts, or funding for a school for the blind in the Capitol, but Calhoun could care a rat's ass about that. A quick glare sends the rats themselves scurrying back into their hiding place, as he marches on, the chromed and all white building glinting in the sunlight coming into clarity in the distance. The pouch of plastic in his hands crunch under the grip, and he likens the sound to bones.

Bones he'll break. Bones he'll break by twisting someone's head in two and cracking their skull on the concrete. Calhoun does not know how to describe what is going over him, to describe how his skin is hot to the touch, where his eyebrows feel as if they have been singed off and there's a hairlessness attached to him, ruining his good looks. Hopefully Lewlyn will have the common knowledge to stay away from him for just this moment, but he isn't so sure that if he comes across the man who has ruined his marriage, he'll be cordial and keep his hands by his side this time.

Calhoun steps into the air conditioned threshold of the Gamemaker Center, plastic bag in hand, fury unchecked, and the cool temperature does little to soothe his nerves. Ahead of him, were he to head straight, Calhoun could step into the actual realm the Gamemakers control, where he can see Lewlyn's auburn hair peaking over one of the railings, she ordering something out, but her voice is shaky, he can hear the timbre drop some, and the authoritarian in her is starting to slip. Rennie is somewhere else in the building, and he is praying that he doesn't run into him. Can he punish himself for some crime he may commit? Can Calhoun do that?

He takes the first left he comes across, stomping down the hallway, past the receptionist. The receptionist is some woman in her mid-twenties - Calhoun has never bothered unfortunately to learn this one's name, as they come and go so quickly now - trying to walk as fast as he can without getting anyone's attention.

"I'm sorry, Mr. President, but she's on a call right now! You can't-" the receptionist interrupts his thought pattern.

"Like hell you're going to tell me what I can't do!" Calhoun snaps back at her, forcing the locked door open and off of one of the hinges.

Bonnie is sitting inside her own office, an office he decorated for her, with one of the solar powered flower canteens sitting in the corner, she holding a phone up to her ear. She jumps at the sudden intrusion, eyes wide, and one hand immediately goes down to drop underneath her desk. Calhoun closes the door gentler than when he opens it, nearly breaking it off, but that isn't saying much, as he practically slams it shit.

"I'm going to have to call you back, darling," his wife utters into the phone quickly, speaking so fast as if she almost never says it. There is the recognizable sound of the phone clamping shut into place, and she scoots back some from her desk. "What the hell, Calhoun?" she exclaims, throwing her hands up. "You just gave me a heart attack!"

He unfurls one of his fists, the one holding the plastic pouch that he had crumpled in his hand, throwing it onto her desk, it landing with a soft _puh_ onto the wood. Calhoun advances, dropping himself closer onto the wooden surface, looming over her, face twisted in a sneer. "I did exactly what you asked me to do, Bonnie. Last night, against my better wishes, I entertained some sick little fantasy of yours in the case that vote was a tie, and I chose to kill some random tribute instead," he cocks his head to the left slightly, narrowing his gaze at her. His wife, his sick little viper with her demented hornet stings. "However, another tribute dies rather than the one I randomly picked. I've got two tributes families, and now two Career districts pissed and on my case because of your stunt. All because you _asked..._ " his tone is dripping with venom.

Bonnie swallows whatever fear she is holding in her throat, shakily getting to her feet, the wheels of her chair rustling on the carpet. "Whatever may be the problem with that, it doesn't give you the excuse to just barge in here, whether you're my husband _or_ not."

Calhoun scoffs, turning away from his wife. "Is that so?" he lifts his head to look at the walls. All mahogany, with pictures of his family and her family draped over them, copies of the pictures in their mansion. Bonnie's grandmother, the strong woman that she used to be before dementia took her, stares deep into his soul, judging him. She had never been a fan of his, and perhaps, now, maybe his wife had never been a fan of his either. "What happened to you asking me if I was keeping secrets from you? It's a two-way street, Bonnie."

She shakes her head, squeezing her eyes shut. "What are you talking about, honey? You aren't making any sense!"

The president swivels on his heel, unbridled fury in his step, he pointing his finger out at her the way it turns into a claw, a claw he'll dangle downwards to tear the skin from her chest. "That," he spits out, pointing at the bag. "That, right there, _sweetie!_ " Calhoun is incapable of remembering the last time he has ever gotten this angry in his entire life, and especially not at Bonnie, his sunshine, his muse... his supposed everything.

Bonnie lifts up the plastic baggie, squinting, but she shakes her head again. "I- I don't see what... I-" she babbles. Oh God, Calhoun wants to bash his head into a wall. She can play the victim so well, can't she?

"It's a hair I found on a pair of your underwear you gave me for the laundry," Calhoun lifts his head in defiance. "A _pubic_ hair, Bonnie..." he shakes his head, as she opens her mouth to rebuttal, wagging a finger. "And not just some random sod's pubic hair. It was red," he rocks back on his heels. "I had Leonidas run a test on it at the lab, a DNA sample," his eyes aglow a poisonous emerald, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat. "Rennie Davis's pubic hair," Bonnie's face goes sheet white. Calhoun's voice is impossibly soft, all the rage in his body rushing out in one fell swoop. "Are- are you cheating on me, Bonnie? Are you having an affair with Rennie _Davis?_ "

His wife stutters, scoffing, mouth open, eyes wide, and she makes her way around the other edge of the desk, grabbing the plastic baggie and crumbling it up in her hands. "You- you're accusing _me_ of cheating?"

"I've got no other options here."

"Would you even believe me if I said no?" Bonnie stares right back at him, her eyes a dangerous and liquidous sapphire blue, her fingers running down the edge of the desk. "For all I know, Rennie is a creep and likes to masturbate into my underwear!"

Calhoun tilts his head back and laughs to the ceiling. God, he cannot believe this woman. His wife may be one of the best pathological liars he's ever met, and that had been why he fell in love with her. "He doesn't have access to the mansion. Only you and I have the keys, and Lewlyn has administrative access. I don't think Lewlyn is stealing underwear from our hamper and giving it to Rennie so he can have fun with it."

"I can't believe you..." Bonnie pinches the bridge of her nose.

He turns away from his wife, returning back to the wall with the picture of her mother hanging on it. The picture is slightly greyed out, it being some time since her passing, the picture being taken before the sicknesses took to her veins and her heart and her mind, before the barriers of sanity were shattered with a sledgehammer. There's a powerful gaze piercing him through the neck, the grandmother's hair having been vibrant and blonde once, Bonnie claims, now withered and gray to the ailing of old age, to the way life saps away little by little, until there's a dry husk with nothing left, the blood and life drained out of the body. What would those eyes say now, to him? To him before he becomes the president? Panem has been ruled for far too long by cruel despots, and Calhoun knows he's a thousand times better than that, a thousand times better than whatever this decrepit, dying woman had ever thought of him.

"What would your grandmother say?" Calhoun asks, voice menacing.

"What do you mean?"

"What would your grandmother say of all this?" he turns to her, smirking. "At the fact that you could be whoring yourself out to a man who can't even speak? Do you think she'd honestly be proud of you?"

"She has no place in any sort of conversation about this."

"Are you cheating on me, Bonnie? Yes or no?"

"Would you even believe me regardless of what I-"

Always the broken record, that one is. "Yes or no, Bonnie. Answer the question," Calhoun with says finality, his voice vibrating with strength. He does not often have the time to show this side of him, he realizes, since wanting to end the Hunger Games has its place for his humanity somewhere in the world, but here and now, that doesn't matter. Rebellion doesn't matter. Treasonous Head Gamemakers do not matter, nor does the sanctity of the nation. It is the sanctity of his marriage.

"No. I've never fooled around with another man as long as I've been with you," her hands go to her stomach. "This child is yours and yours only, Calhoun," she approaches him timidly from having rested up against the desk, placing a hand up against his face, her skin cold to his warmth, and he shudders into the feeling. He likes this, he wants more of this, but does he want more of this with _her?_ "You told me yesterday that you'd be with me in the long fight. I am here, too. We have to do this together, or we'll get eaten and picked clean apart."

He rests his forehead up to hers, sighing deeply. No kissing. That's weakness. "I believe you, Bonnie. I just- I don't know what or how to feel when I saw that hair yesterday, and still went through doing what I did. It took a lot out of me watching Carrion die last night. I would've picked Linden had it been between Valencia and him, if I was going to choose, but..." Calhoun trails off. He shakes his head, balling his tongue up against his teeth, sliding them over the gaps.

"What, darling?" Bonnie drapes a hand over his back, she looking back at the door that he bust open. He knows that she's never seen that exertion of force before.

Calhoun steps over to the windowsill, looking out over the courtyard of the Capitol's main district sector, at all the citizens going on and doing their normal, daily, boring lives. How they all watch the Games and laugh and cry and laugh some more, drinking their martinis, sitting in their cozy chairs, while one kid is disemboweled, the other comes back with PTSD, mothers and fathers cradling life in their arms watch their children evaporated into steam and distant memories... he cannot afford that anymore, no more than he can afford losing Bonnie, the way he feels her slipping out of his grasp.

"Whether or not anything has actually been done... the fact that it is _Rennie..._ that's what gets me," he looks at his wife. "Didn't you say that he tried kissing you a few weeks ago? I didn't believe you, I think. I passed it off," Calhoun looks at his reflection in the window, disgusted by what he sees. "Did I enable this?" his hand turns into a fist. "If he's lusting after you and stealing your underwear and-" a cutoff of air, he taking a deep breath, "I'm going to make that avox wish he had never been born."

"Don't do anything, please," Bonnie begs, stepping up to Calhoun, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder. "Don't blow anything out of proportion, please? I can handle it. I can handle him," she says with resolution. "Promise me, Calhoun."

"Don't make me promise..." he whines, leaning into her grip, nuzzling her cheek with the scruff of his beard.

He looks at himself in the mirror, latching onto his wife, latching onto his beautiful, snake-eyed, viper breathing, cobra speaking wife, and all of her scaliness. Where did they go wrong? Calhoun does not have the answer for that; however he does have an answer for something else, though.

If this Rennie, a person he's known so much has done something to his wife... he is going to make the man regret ever poking the hornet's nest fifteen feet away with a stick.

Calhoun is a man of mercy, he knows this, he's done it plenty of times before. He will not grant mercy to those who defy him, however.

He'll grant Rennie Davis a new appendage, a new tongue to speak with, and then slice it off root and stem with a hot knife himself, this time.

Calhoun Rodney holds no prisoners.

* * *

 **Alright, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #42: The Hornet's Nest, and we've made some significant plotline improvements, advancements, what have you. I am very happy and excited for the last leg of our journey, as this chapter here and henceforth is the final arc of Sheep Led to Slaughter, the end. You will all be happy to also hear that these three Capitol chapters are being squished down to two instead, and I am cutting one of the chapters out of circulation, since I felt the plotlines in it were filler and didn't need to be there, so now we're going from 51 to 50 chapters, so we are literally eight chapters away from the very end; the next arena chapter is now #44, and #45, and the victor chapter is #46, not #47 like I originally had.**

 **Focusing on the chapter some, I think Lance has brought up some very good points, the only Capitol OC character I feel I have left in the dust just a bit, behind Arizona and Hector and Kevia and Hale, but he has his part to play, even if you all do not see it yet. His little advice to Hale is something all of these victors need to keep in the backs of their minds, but they won't follow it, will they? How do you see this particular arc of the Arizona and Hale romance being neatly finished? Curious for thoughts.**

 **This other section here was one I was beyond stoked for... because Bonnie's past has somewhat caught up with her, hasn't it? Calhoun in his early designs, I had him as a President Snow-esque sort of character - I have used my other OC Hunger Games series, which I am in the process of rewriting and will be adding Part III to the site sometime this fall, probably beginning to post around October, I think - but he has evolved into a pragmatic man who is going to end the Hunger Games... do you think Bonnie has cheated or not, or that Rennie is a creep? I understand that this section of the Capitol storyline is somewhat more faceted and spirals off into three sub-categories with the other five characters focused in it, but how do you see each little node being tied off? I'm curious for this one too.**

 **Beyond that, I will have Chapter #43: The Olive Branch Petition, most definitely out before the end of this week, hopefully far earlier than Saturday (I'll see if I can aim for a Wednesday night, Thursday morning sort of update), so I can get onto the next arena chapter as quick as I can - that I will say will most likely not be done before the end of July, which is next Wednesday, the 31st, but I'll try my hardest. #43 is a continuation of the Capitol storyline, big things planned, and back to the arena for #44: Four Souls to Die. Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope you all review. I love you all so very much! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	43. Forgiven Steps (Capitol Plot XIII)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #43: The Olive Branch Petition, which is a continuation of our OC Capitol storyline. This is it, ladies and gents, we have neared the end of the story, and we are in the throes of the last arc (End of Games), which is from this chapter till the end, Chapter #50, so we're almost here. I am having such a hard time containing my excitement, because, at this point with heavy deliberation, my victor has been decided, and the rest of the plot regarding both sectors is complete too, and nothing - I don't think anyways - is going to change my mind. Next chapter is #44: Four Souls to Die, an arena chapter, which I will hope to write at god speed, but I digress. Enjoy Chapter #43: The Olive Branch Petition.**

* * *

 ** _Bonnie Rodney: Designer of the Mutts P.O.V_**

* * *

The sun may be shining outside, but it is nothing compared to the fueled rage deep inside her heart, a roaring inferno no water could quell, nor quench, nor separate. Bonnie stands in the center of the Gamemaker center, staring at the multiple screens showing the four tributes left alive in the arena, and her mind is racing at a million thoughts a minute. The world is one painted over sheet of idyllic gray, where the other colors of the rainbow disappear behind the gray, washed out and dried out, all plastic, all metallic. It makes her sick, the manufacturing, which is ironic, given her position.

She places a hand on her stomach, where the child inside her is forming, and she closes her eyes, breathing in and out. She shouldn't be living like this, in fear for her child, in fear of what her husband could do. Bonnie has never seen Calhoun act that angry in her entire life, and if everything around her falls silent, she can still hear the way his voice shakes the pictures on the wall, or how his glare pierces through her, in ways she didn't know were possible. She's sensed a darkness behind him, in the way his face can twitch as he smiles, shaking some diplomat's hand, but it didn't occur to her in her wildest dreams that they'd flip onto her.

Bonnie closes her eyes, feeling her stomach. She wants the process over already, to speed up the nine months of pregnancy, just so she can hold her - _their,_ her mind corrects, _you and Calhoun's child, not just yours_ \- child in her arms, to wrap them up in swaddling clothes and place them in a manager. She knows of that faith, and she knows her baby will be better than some fabled religion hero. She must be in that child's life, to teach them what is right, and to lead them in the right direction, to point out others' mistakes. All she will have to do is point at her husband, when his rage overtakes him. He'll want their infant immediately, to seize and latch onto them to spread more of his legacy propaganda. Newsflash, Calhoun, she'd say. Someone's worth more and has a higher merit to their name regardless of legacy, regardless of what they leave behind.

Someone joins her by the screens, slamming something down onto the counterspace in front of her, causing Bonnie to jump, her thoughts scattering like static lines, hazy and blizzard white, into the empty space. Bonnie looks over at Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis, the woman having placed a pot of flowers on the counter. The auburn hair is too familiar, the same shade in the plastic bag. She has it incinerated, like Rennie's tongue. She sees the aftermath of that, before the appendage is thrown into the fire. Pink and red and black, and Bonnie is unable to look away. Wondering what it must've felt like in her mouth, swirling around her cheeks.

Bonnie bites on her lower lip, trying to stem the memory. She didn't cheat! She tried kissing Rennie one time, he got feelings twisted, and now her husband is hot on everyone's heels. Of course Satan's secretary has to come up with her; Bonnie hasn't interacted with Lewlyn in a few days, and she wasn't missing her company at all.

"Good morning," she says cheerfully, Lewlyn's hair tied back into a simple ponytail, it bobbing and swaying side to side as she speaks, moving her head.

"Good morning," Bonnie greets likewise, but much less cheerful, hands resting on the counterspace, clenching and unclenching into fists. Fists that'll rip Rennie's tongue out, fists that'll blacken Calhoun's eyes, fists that will break Lewlyn's noise. Fists that will dismantle Panemian society brick by brick, cornerstone by cornerstone.

"Anything interesting happening yet?" Lewlyn rocks on her heels.

The president's wife checks a tableside watch with a side eye, and then looks at the Head Gamemaker with a deranged stare. "It's only nine; none of them are awake."

"Alright, well-" she continues.

"What's going on here?" Bonnie turns side faced to Lewlyn, interrupting her statement in its tracks. Lewlyn stops speaking, lips pursed, turning likewise. "What are you doing?" she repeats. Her skin is crawling, as if there is an entire ant hill running up and down her legs, and they're biting her, the bites marking her neck and arms and face, turning her pale flesh into a constellation of crimson red and itchiness.

Lewlyn frowns, oh that so ever signature frown of hers where she pushes her eyebrows together, frowning. Bonnie wants to rip off her eyebrows. "Bonnie, I don't-"

"You've never been nice to me, not like this," a lump forms in her throat, and she is unable to swallow it down. It'll appear out of her mouth, a ball of fiery hot rage. All she sees when she looks at Lewlyn is her brother, with his ghostly face, and awkward smile. Bonnie wants to puke, now. "Which means you've got something planned."

"Nothing planned," the Head Gamemaker shakes her head, and the spiders return to crawl down Bonnie's throat. She looks around, but not at Bonnie, who keeps her gaze directed at her and nowhere else. "I got this for you," Lewlyn says, and then pushes the pot of flowers closer to the president's wife.

"What are these?" Bonnie doesn't even give them a second glance, her left eye starting to twitch. She doesn't trust anything about this. For all she knows, those flowers are poisonous; for all she knows, the moment she inhales the scent of just one of them, her nostrils will be filled with some noxious gas, choking her from the outside in, turning her lungs black as coal dust and charcoal dissolve her bloodstream, and she falls apart. It isn't like Lewlyn to just be _charitable._

"Flowers, silly," Lewlyn pushes her slightly, smiling, and the war sirens go off in her head. Oh, _screw that._

Bonnie's nostrils flare. She doesn't know who to be more mad at, her husband, or her arch-nemesis. Why does the woman get under her skin the way she does? Bonnie has always applauded herself for being strong willed, for not succumbing to the catering desires like the other heathens she plans to rule over one day - now, if Rennie is asking, she'll undo herself and succumb to his desire, wrapping flesh around flesh, suckling till there's nothing left, but don't tell Calhoun that - and never stooping to Lewlyn's level.

The moment the Head Gamemaker's hand rested against her shoulder, Bonnie's entire nervous system spiraled out of control, and she raises her hand, wanting to slap the ginger straight across the face. However, as Lewlyn's eyes look into hers, stupefied and curious, she reconsiders. Bonnie grabs the calling card hanging off of one of the leaves, that leaf belonging to a gorgeous rose, thorned and prickly as ever. She rips off the little manila card, the string it is attached to floating to the counterspace.

She flaps it open. "A gift for you, Bonnie, Panem's mother, and a soon to be one. Love, Lewlyn," Bonnie reads, and bile nearly comes out as she finishes, but she swallows it down, burnt acid and sewage and all, because she's composed, and she doesn't stoop to the levels of the woman who thought that giving her flowers would help in any circumstance. She raises an eyebrow, holding out the calling card to the side. "Love Lewlyn?" she frowns. "Seriously?"

Lewlyn's face falters, and her lips turn into a downcast frown, eyes saddened. Bonnie is not amused. "You- you don't like them?"

"They're beautiful, sure," she says quickly, giving one last look at them. It's a pile of roses, a mesh of blue and white and reds, as navy and pearlescent and crimson overlap one another, in a blanket of harmony, and Bonnie wants to throw the pot and the woman who bought them into the incinerator too. That is where everything goes, after all, in the Capitol, when it needs to be disposed of. All thrown away into the fire, where there is no phoenix rising from the ashes, instead it is a sickness, a plague, and Bonnie breaths in the smoke and the sulfur until her bones rust over. "But why would you give them to me? You hate me."

"I don't hate you," and she places a hand on her shoulder, Bonnie giving her a withering glare. "You're the one that hates me," Lewlyn shakes her ponytail. "Besides, I hope this could mean something for the both of us."

"Like what?" she removes the woman's hand, taking a step away from her and the counterspace.

There are a few other officials and Gamemakers and an avox or two milling around the floor, but they're absorbed in their work and not in two leaders of the country, in which Bonnie applauds herself for the idea of being a leader. No one is looking to her to rally up the troops, to lead the Peacekeepers into battle. Bonnie grabs at her neck, pulling taut the skin that meets where the two folds of the neck collide.

"A sign to move past all of that," Lewlyn explains, crossing her hands together all womanly like. Bonnie snorts to herself. Lewlyn couldn't be a mother even if there did exist some man in the sky with a gavel, giving out orders, judging those from some high and mighty chair. She can challenge that paragon if she chooses, but Bonnie knows that she doesn't need to exert control like that. It wouldn't be a fight for her, but the god she casts down from the heavens. "Water under the bridge."

"A fresh start," Bonnie says, and the word is like holly coming out of her mouth. Plastic, poison, bitter and revolting. Her skin is still crawling.

"An olive branch," Lewlyn takes a step forward to her, tentatively approaching. Bonnie's eyes narrow, turning back to the Head Gamemaker. _That is right. Approach me with fear. We are not equals. We've never been equals, and don't think that'll start now._ "We've been at each other's throats for too long, and it is making this administration suffer," she gestures down at her belly. "Besides, I feel like, with you having a child, it could mean we could start over," the woman laughs, and Bonnie wants to cut off her own ears with cheese graters. "Maybe I could even become your child's Godmother!"

" _Not even if you were the most beautiful woman on the planet, you troll,"_ Bonnie thinks to herself, and then she smiles wryly. "That's very forward of you," she extends her hand. "I'll keep the flowers, thank you for them," she smiles, " _So I can throw them into the incinerator, along with you, and your pathetic brother who I thought I cared for. Your entire family can burn, and my baby will frolic in the ashes like it's a sandpit,_ " and then, shaking her head. "I'll accept your olive branch."

Lewlyn shakes her hand, likewise, grinning from ear to ear, and Bonnie needs someone to run over and pinch her, to wake her up from this godawful nightmare. "Thank you," and then she exits the handshake, throwing her arms around her in a hug.

Bonnie squeals a noise of protest, half mouse and half T-Rex roar, but she hugs back. " _You hug me again, I'll slit your throat from ear to ear with my earrings..._ " and the two let go. "And thank you," she says, and god, there better be tears in her eyes, or otherwise this has all been for nothing.

The Head Gamemakers squeezes her hands, gives a slight nod, and makes her way back up the stairs, Bonnie following her with her gaze, and the eye twitches resume once more, but this time, she doesn't press something up against it to make them stop. She'll let the rage consume her, and perhaps she can consume all her enemies in that tornado, too.

She looks back at the flowers, of some stupid olive branch petition, as if that will solve _anything_ in their lives. The hugs, the hands on the shoulders, the insurrections, the treasons, and the brother of a whore, two siblings who screw each other.

Bonnie is going to kill her, she's decided.

She is going to kill Lewlyn Davis.

* * *

 ** _Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis P.O.V_**

* * *

"This is for you," Lewlyn says, reaching inside the box sitting next to her, she in her brother's apartment, Rennie sitting on his all white couch, dressed up for the occasion - a date, if her memory serves correct - and she extends the object towards him. His eyes widen, his mouth turns into a smile, and her heart elates at his reaction. "I- I hope you like it."

Rennie is incapable of closing his mouth, it open in a round 'o', with those perfect lips, and Lewlyn's gaze falls over them, but she swallows, sticking to her guns. " _For me?_ " he signs, and Lewlyn is amazed at how quick he is learning the Panemian sign language. Learning a whole new language in his thirties is quite crazy, but it is something odd and interesting the Calhoun administration has with them; they all speak a different language other than just English. Calhoun knows German and Italian, Bonnie can speak fluently in Arabic, Pollux picks up Latin in his youth, and Lewlyn has dabbled in Spanish a few times, but is the least fluent. Her brother on the other hand has never learned a foreign language.

"For you, yes," and she cannot help but break into a smile. "I was thinking about how we all know these languages, and you never really learned one," Lewlyn places one hand on the end of Rennie's gift, guiding his right hand to the other end so they can hold it up together. "However, you knew the language of melodies and harmonies and music. I want to inspire that in you again."

He clenches her gift tightly, but she can picture him dropping it, and then the entire world goes to shit, and she loses her mind. However, that'd be old Lewlyn Davis, the woman not trying to put water under the bridge, the woman that tied her brother to chairs and made him screw her, or the woman who sliced his tongue off and then made him watch as it shriveled up in the flames.

" _Thank you..._ " he signs again, placing the gift on the couch, resting up against a pillow.

"You're welcome, Rennie," Lewlyn's entire body feels like a hearth, gently pushed around with a poker, coal lighting up the atmosphere just above the cauldron. She digs into the box for one last object, seizing it with deft fingers, dancing the object in circles as she pulls it into the air. "One last gift for it. Every instrument needs a tool, after all."

Lewlyn hands her brother a bow, wooden and spray painted a copper color - she winces inwardly when she sees the combination; perhaps that color choice could have been thought over a bit better, huh? - he taking it, twirling it in his fingers. Rennie looks down the bow, tears forming in his eyes, and he plucks at the string, delicate in his hand, the way it strums up and down, vibrating on the air.

He glances over at the violin resting on his couch, going over to it. The violin is around the size of his forearm, but Lewlyn knows her brother doesn't need any instrument larger than that. The violin is wood as well, made of pine trees off in a private brooklet just outside the Capitol, where the sun shines on it twenty-four seven, the trees sprayed by the finest water that can be exported from District 4 and purified, to keep the trees alive year-round even when the temperature plummets into the negatives. He picks up the instrument, fingers tracing the strings that extend from end to end, lightly snipping off laces holding a puppet off, they falling lax and milling onto the floor. Rennie traces a circle with a thumb at the head of the violin, cardinal paint coming off and onto his finger when he lifts up. The violin is given a rustic look to it, to match with the bow, and the designer who creates the instrument for her is paid very well, Lewlyn sees to it that the person never needs to make another instrument for anyone ever again, with how much she's paid.

"Still freshly coated," Lewlyn steps forward. "Parts of it, anyways," she smiles. "Do- do you like it?"

Rennie raises a eyebrow at her, momentarily, and her heart stops in her chest. He doesn't like her gift? How- why- after all- it doesn't matter. The ex-avox shifts the bow to his other hand. " _Of course I love it, Lewlyn._ "

"Do- do you think you could play a song for me? Like you used to?" she asks. It is a daring and bold move, and Lewlyn knows it, but she's been feeling a bit risky lately, approaching Bonnie, pledging the olive branch and all. Her own eyes have witnessed the moment the blade goes _snicker-snack_ against his flesh, where there's the spray of crimson and blood and pale tatters that fly everywhere, the soul inside Rennie get sucked away to some deep, dark place, where the sun does not shine, and plants do not grow. She is the reason his muse is gone; she is the reason she's ripped out root and stem his love and appreciation for music. It is his destiny to play on the largest concert stages, and she's destroyed it.

Lewlyn is hesitant to place her hands over Rennie's, touching both, skin sensual to the touch. Rennie's eyes meet her, and she's thunderstruck, like the very first time they had sex, under the amber light of a bedside lamp, lightning and thunder bombarding the windows outside as it stormed. How his eyes electrified her, a spark racing through her body, but there's a hint of sadness behind his eyes, and in the background, where she cannot hear it, the snapping of plastic gloves and the marching of a Peacekeeper's boots on the tile, and the sweet siren song of the blade.

" _Not tonight,"_ but there is no bitterness or sadness in Rennie's eyes this time. " _I haven't played in years. I have to get acclimated again._ "

She nods her head, completely understanding. "I understand, Rennie. At your own speed, of course."

" _Thank you. You- you have no idea what this means to me!"_ and he throws his arms around her in a hug, startling her. When is the last time the two of them have had this sort of contact with one another, without there being a secret agenda on the other end of it? Lewlyn cannot think of a time back then. Rennie presses his lips against the side of her temple, holding onto her for a second, and then resuming the hug.

Lewlyn sees stars behind her eyes, and when she unlatches herself from the hug, needing to take a seat on his couch, her body is in sensory overload. Her mind is buzzing, static and joyous noise, an euphonic breeze blowing through a meadow of azaleas and a cacophic thunderstorm or cymbal crash colliding together. Rennie does not notice this, as he turns around and heads further into his apartment to set the violin down, placing it back on the mantle above his bed where it has always been.

" _He hugged me,"_ her mind is running at a mile a minute. " _He- he actually touched me, physically!"_ She's about to hyperventilate.

Rennie joins her back in the living room, and she shakes off the jitters. A Davis is composed, especially in the face of those that used to make them all discombobulated. Plans have been made, and she's been joining Calhoun in secret more often than she'd like to admit, and now that she's bridged the trust between her and her brother, with the sign language and the violin and the freedom, he's ready to know.

She places a palm down on her pant leg, and for the first time all day, Lewlyn notices that she's shaking violently, as if she has the tremors - there is zero nervousness in her bloodstream approaching Bonnie in the Gamemaker center, moreso a feeling of weightlessness when speaking with the other woman - but here, her body is vibrating so hard she's creating heat waves that rival the sun.

Lewlyn's palm is sweaty, and there are red paint stains sticking to her skin, now getting on her leg where she places her hand. "Listen, Rennie, we- we need to talk."

" _What about?_ "

"It's serious. It's-" she swallows the rock in her throat. "It's more than serious, Rennie. It can mean life and death if it goes wrong."

Rennie's eyes widen to the size of saucers, another display of that innocence. Before, well _before,_ as far back as Lewlyn can remember, her brother had always been the one firmly in the circle of fantasy, dancing at all the balls and dances with suitors and women of the circle, living a life of opulence that had been so deeply dipped in gold, it made Midas's touch pale in comparison. How her brother would believe life as a fantasy, to simply stand on concert stages and swish his bow left and right, and music notes would pop out. Her brother used to tell her, when they'd sit by the fireplace, back in their early twenties, how he could see the notes flutter to the halcyon bands in the ceiling, shattering like shards of glass and pearlescent foam back down to the stage, pulsating in sound waves when they crashed. His innocence has always been there, forced to grow up the moment Calhoun puts his insignia on the treason documents, and his fate is sealed.

Somehow, in some corner of her brother's mind, he's held onto that innocence. She does not know how it is even possible, but it is there, in the way he smiles at a sunbeam crossing a windowsill, or in the way he bows to her when he sees her now outside of work occasions. The way he sips his coffee, the way he ties towels around his waist when stepping out of the shower. His voice, speaking in a high manner... oh how she wishes her brother could stay locked behind those magnificent golden gates, forever locked in his candied world, with gumdrops and sugar plums.

"Calhoun is thinking of ending the Hunger Games next year, Rennie," and the widening of his eyes grows. "The 100th year would finish out, of course. We're simply too far in, but at the reaping of the 101st, he'd make a public speech announcing their termination," she swallows again, searching at the corners of every window. They could be bugged. Someone could by spying. The Capitol is a rat's nest riddled with vipers, hornets buzzing around to sting any passerby, and no matter how many olive branches Lewlyn forges in secret will be enough to mend the bridge that has been burning for a hundred years plus. "Only him, myself, and Hector Merviere know of the plan," she takes a step towards him. "Calhoun told me it was okay for me to tell you, since I trust you, and he trusts you too," she squeezes his hand. "Bonnie or Pollux or any of the other victors, _no one,_ " she tightens her grip. "Is allowed to know about this. It must remain a secret between us, yes?"

" _Of course. Silent as the grave, Lewlyn._ "

"If this gets out, it could mean the death of us all," Lewlyn says, leaving no way to sugarcoat it, no way for Rennie's imagination to latch on and take hold. "You understand? Nod your head if you do; you need to know what this means for us," her heart hammers in her chest. "It'll mean a war for Panem, I feel."

He nods his head. " _I understand._ "

Her throat goes dry, Lewlyn licking her lips. "One more thing," and she crouches down to one knee, tears in her eyes. "That afternoon, the moment Calhoun makes the announcement about ending the Games, I'm going to turn myself in to the Capitol guard. I'm going to send myself to prison, Rennie."

Her brother opens his mouth to protest, but all that will come out is a caged bird song, trapped behind iron bars where the syllables want to flutter and float and fly like those music notes he hallucinates, but she will not grant him that power.

"You won't be able to convince me of anything else, Rennie," a second tear falls down her cheek. "I've done bad things to the people of Panem. I've done bad things to you," another interruption, "Don't deny them!" she yells at him, and Rennie sinks into the couch a bit more, reminiscent of the days with silver tape and silver blades. Lewlyn settles the quiet back into her bloodstream. "I- I am going to try to mend as many broken bridges as I can, to do the right for all the wrongs I have done in my life," she breaks into a smile. "I just want to be good, Rennie. If I can't do anything else in my life, just please, _please_ let me do this."

Rennie lifts a hand up and presses it against her face, Lewlyn shuddering at the touch, cold synapse shocking through her spinal cord and reaching the base of her brain, she seeing blizzards behind a backdrop of his auburn hair. " _I love you, sister,"_

"I love you too, Rennie," Lewlyn utters a gasp, and the tears have overwhelmed her. "I'll always love you."

The two sob into each other's arms the rest of the night.

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #43: The Olive Branch Petition, the next continuation of our OC storyline in the Capitol that is rearing up to be almost over. Also, hey, word count is now over the hill of 300k word count guys; second story ever with that!**

 **Someone want to explain why I have tears in my eyes, guys? Seriously, I started crying the moment I wrote Lewlyn giving Rennie a brand new violin she had made for him, and writing on and on made it worse. I never would have thought that my favorite relationship between characters would be between a brother and sister that have had such a dark past, that Lewlyn and Rennie as a duo would be my favorite aspect of this story, in which it is, and I think that Lewlyn just might be my favorite character of the story, above any of the tributes... I would have never predicted this.**

 **Beyond that, maybe her and Bonnie will reach somewhere that is at least at a truce, and it looks like Lewlyn's new leaf is legitimate, someone else is in on the ending the Hunger Games scheme, and that our crazed Head Gamemaker is sending her own self on the way to hell. Anyone have last minute plot predictions to how this all turns out for our delightful Capitol characters? I am having such a blast with this, I am.**

 **Next chapter, ladies and gentlemen, is Chapter #44: Four Souls to Die, and I will be hopefully posting that late on August 1st or extremely early on August 2nd, and that will be our final four tributes fighting for their lives in the arena. I will be trying my best at a single POV a day to get it out as early as I can; I am so excited for the end, ya'll have no idea. Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope you all review; I'd love your feedback, comments, praise, criticisms, and more! Have a great day! Love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	44. Four Souls to Die (Day 9)

**Hey everybody, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new Sheep Led to Slaughter chapter, #44: Four Souls to Die, the next arena chapter for this story. We are down to, as the title states, our final four tributes: Valencia Shale of District 1, Milor Drusus of District 2, and Peri Florence / Linden Hazel of District 7, the only district left as a duo. Last chapter, #41: Vengeance in our Veins, was the final five tribute vote-off, and it was supposed to be a tie between Valencia and Linden as to who was booted, but due to someone's interference, it switched to it being Milor who'd die, but Carrion took the fall instead and sacrificed himself. This chapter will be intense, violent, and all the more reason to stick to the end! Enjoy Chapter #44: Four Souls to Die.**

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V_**

* * *

Gray walls.

Gray skies.

Gray everything.

Valencia runs a hand through her hair, tied back into a ponytail, exhaling deeply through her lungs and expelling anxiety out onto the concrete, it appearing in misty waves into the atmosphere. She turns around to look behind herself, hand gripping and tightening around the hilt of her sword, also gray. Gray weapons, gray floors, gray shadows underneath her eyes, everywhere she goes the color follows her. Drab. Dull. Depressing. There's no one behind her, she's sure, and the lake, the massive lake she has cut through, is quiet, but she dares not disturb it to see what could lie inside. Maybe more Capitol mutts, and there's no deranged girl with a flamethrower and multiple personalities to come and save her this time.

Everyone most likely wants her dead.

She sucks in her breath last night, when the tally goes down between her and Linden - District 7 must've voted for her, and the two boys must've picked Linden, a choice she applauds; Peri must be close to dead at this point, now, with the cancer and all - and she draws out her weapon. It is a thought that had been stuck in the back of her head, whispering every chance it got to cause her heart to sink into the endless bottom of her chest cavity. She had been the second highest person at the last vote-off with eighteen tributes left alive, and with five left, she knew, sadly, how high on the list she'd end up. Still sends rivets of shock through her, and she presses herself up against a wall of the building she is sleeping under, eyes alert, turning to face whatever is in her direction that makes a noise.

Valencia forgets how to breathe when she watches the screen distort, and all the tally marks fly over into Milor's column, and her heart nearly stops. Milor didn't deserve to die - frankly, _none_ of them deserved to die, but she is not going to try to philosophize then and there the merits of living or not; she isn't Plato or Socrates - but when the face in the sky shows Carrion as the dead tribute, her heart sinks whilst forgetting to pump blood. She knows then and there that the male from Four must've jumped in front of whatever it was sent to kill Milor, and then, as she falls back against the wall, pressing a hand to her forehead to wipe sweat away, her breathing becomes erratic. Oh _shit._

Milor believes it to either be Linden or her to bite the bullet and be killed, or maybe both of them if the Gamemakers wanted to be a screwing bunch. Then he observes the rules being changed on him mid-game, the table flipped and the board thrown out of orientation, and to top it off like a little cherry on a melting sundae, his boyfriend sacrifices himself. That is what gets her heart pumping. Had it been Milor that died, realistically, in her mind, the only threat left in the arena, then Carrion and Peri succumb to their illness and ailments, and she bests Linden in a fight... that's easy.

Now? She more than likely has to go through Milor in the end. Her closest rival, the one with the second highest training score beneath her, a fellow Career, good-looking, naturally liked... Valencia knows she has her work cut out for her. Losing Carrion does not help, she is certain, and now, he's enraged. She can sense it across the arena, wherever the male from Two is sleeping or fighting or what have you, that the air tightens, becomes thicker, because Milor Drusus has lost it, has broken his own spine in two, and he's coming for her.

It is what she notices, naturally, and what everyone else in the alliance had noticed. Whilst Maisey had simply been openly hostile, awkwardly enough with her low training score - being the lowest after all - Milor is different in his resistance. Passive aggressiveness. Constant side-eye looks, questioning her decisions by providing illogical options in the background, but since it came from _Milor,_ and not her, and since he is the underdog between the two of them with the charisma of Pollux Aetos and the president mixed together, she's a shallow puddle. She cannot charm a chair to rock, let alone convince an entire group of people to think like she does. To get home, she'll have to outlive - likely _beat_ \- her biggest competitor, and Valencia tightens the grip on her sword reflexively, bracing it out in front of her.

However, Milor is simply a fly on a wall in comparison to the then and now.

Valencia smiles to herself when she wakes up, not because she lives another day, but because she is right, and for Valencia Shale, that does not happen too often. Having fallen asleep close to the lakeside, she is awoken by an awful grinding noise underneath her, rocking the bench she has fallen asleep up against. She snaps awake, reaching for her blade, yelling out a battle-cry, to soften her facial expressions when the staircase from before, from way before, five days ago at this point - when Persephone had been alive, the girl's dark hair crossing her face, lips pressed sensually up against her temple, knots being undone in her lower back as the hands crept down... Valencia shudders and the burnt alive girl vanishes like her ashes did - as she sees the entrance across the lake, igniting the spark that takes off into fruition... she's found it.

The Career from District 1 stands in front of the entrance she had seen across the lake, it being a staircase down into a dimly lit hallway. Like before, with the Hall of Mystery yesterday - Marcus's voice from the ghost that never existed rings in her head, but she chooses to ignore it, it doesn't matter to her anymore, and it never will again - her skin itches as if someone is pouring spiders all over her from above, her hair stands on end that this is a bad idea, but since Valencia has had a slew of them - make the entire team cut through the Hall of Mystery, make Persephone check out the noise in the distance, approach the trashcan mutt, that's just to name a few - she is used to them by now, and the excitement charges her up from the bottom, spiraling up her nervous system and creating chinks in her brain. Nothing else to be afraid of now, Valencia rationalizes.

The Gamemakers have to know she has seen this entrance, to wherever it may lead, and they've done nothing about it. They've done nothing to hide it, and they've done nothing to dissuade her from reaching it, as Marcus's live ghost is her doing, from a lacking mental state - and the warning signs in this line of thinking have yet to appear. The worst she can think of, at the end of this hallway she is about to go down, is some death trap, but Valencia is prepared for that 75% chance of death, 25% chance of survival odds going on, despite still being the tribute with the lowest loss ratio in accordance with the other points.

No turning back, right?

Valencia looks behind her once more, turning back literally - she kicks herself mentally for the statement of not changing her mind - and the coast is clear. No tributes hiding in the bushes, no swords poking out of the foliage. She exhales a shaky breath, evaporating like steam into the air, and she steps down into the hallway, backpack on, sword equipped, senses up, and her heart beating like a racehorse's hooves pounding on the dirt below.

The hallway is significantly colder than it is outside, her body seizing up as she makes the approach downwards, slowly going down the steps, her shadow elongating on the envelope between the metal hall and the grassy Earth. Goosebumps erupt over her arm like boils or leprosy spots, and Valencia shudders, not wanting to bring her hands together. The hallway is gray entirely, as its walls stretch from end to end, she unable to see any sort of stopping point in sight. C'est la vie, correct? There are lights placed on the walls every few feet, cylindrical in shape, emitting a dark red hue over the walls, and she swears that the reds are bouncing in and out as she walks down the hall, as if they're imitating some worldly function. It hits her, as she gets closer to one of the lights, hearing it hum quietly, like a just awakening wasp, or her brother mumbling to himself in his sleep.

A heartbeat. The lamps are acting like a heartbeat.

Valencia gently pokes the wall with her sword, expecting to hear the dismal noise of metal grinding against metal - the only noise in the world, actually, to make her wince - but instead, likewise with the mirrors in the Hall of Mystery, the material of the wall seems to morph around the sword point, retracting and physically bouncing, as if hit with a shockwave, and instead her weapon does not shatter the pressure point; her sword remains untouched, when she lifts it back to her eyes, seeing that there's not a single sign of wear and tear; not a single sign of struggle, and the wall behind her has stopped fluctuating. Valencia observes the outlining on the weapon, a thin line interlacing another thin line, those colored a stunning, sharper brick color, and the Panemian gold crossing that, to watch for the movements.

She reaches the middle point of the hall, she takes it, and at one end, some console sticking out of the wall, and the other way, sunlight, freedom, and maybe, if she dares be so bold, zero chance of death. Valencia balances her sword in her grip, moving the other hand that is free to the bottom of the hilt, to give her a better arc and stance in fighting. The console, as she approaches, seems to emanate some sort of warmth, as she can see this yellow, almost sienna hue hanging over the machinery, but there's no noise coming from this one like the crackling of popcorn in the glowing red lamps. Outside? Her heart skips a beat?

Has she approached the outside of the arena? Valencia can't see any cameras; she could do it, couldn't she? The girl can escape!

The console seems to react to her footsteps, booting up, and an intercom whirling from inside the device and out into the hallway exterior, taking up a few inches. Valencia sucks in a breath, eyes wandering the ceiling for trip wires or something of that effect. Again, her coast is clear, and Valencia sheathes her sword, the metal grinding into the scabbard as she locks it into place like a belt around her waist.

A whirring comes from the console, the console more or less just the speaker, and a tiny light in the upper right corner, currently blinking halcyon, a feeling of relief washing over her entire body as she approaches and sees said light. The speaker juts out a bit, and then the whirring noises stop.

"Good afternoon, Capitol official," an automated voice on the other says, sounding entirely computer generated, with the choppy tone, misspelled dialogue, and the blood, all the blood. Valencia looks at the walls. This is meant for Capitol officials; well she is _officially_ in no man's land, in kingpin territory, looking at a place that could be threatening, and all she feels is the need to show them up. Show the Gamemakers wrong, prove to Milor she is more than a brute, and above all, to Marcus. Marcus did what he did, and she feels this in her heart, due to because her failing as a leader; she wasn't leading the pack correctly last time. Did he decide to betray her and the Careers because he saw where Valencia had them headed? "Please state your name for audio recognition."

She raises an eyebrow. The jackpot - getting inside, or rather, in this case, outside - could be escaping, and all it requires is her voice? No scam? No sham? Valencia turns her gaze upwards, staring at the corners of the hallway, but there doesn't look to be any sort of hatches that could pop open and kill her, so her heart is assured and at ease. "Valencia Shale," she says, directly into the microphone, "Female tribute from District 1."

The console makes another whirring noise, and a camera pops out from the center of the speaker, zooming in on her, causing her to take a precautionary step back. Nothing, still, seems to happen, but the yellow light switches colors from a shining lemonade to a darker, hazier sunburst orange. "Error. Unable to identify authorization. Please repeat name for audio recognition," the console requests.

Valencia unsheathes her sword again, having it out for defensive purposes. "Valencia Shale. Female tribute from District 1."

The color on the console goes from yellow, to orange, to the color of blood, almost instantaneously. _Uh-oh._ The terminal shakes, and the hatches open up at the top, sirens dropping down into the hallway. "Intruder alert, intruder alert!" the controller screams out in its automated voice. "Intruder alert, intruder alert! This terminal will self-destruct in thirty seconds."

"Oh shit!" she shouts.

"Thirty... twenty-nine, twenty-eight..." the console continues to drone on.

"Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, oh shit," Valencia keeps on repeating, turning around and racing for her life down to the other end of the hallway. The terminal keeps on shaking, as if undergoing an earthquake, and behind her, the doors seemed to fold in on one another, as the panels off the roof fell from up high to the ground, shattering into thousands of tiny pieces of glass when they hit. Valencia ducks under one falling in front of her, the ground buckling beneath her, she dodging out of the way.

" _This is always happening to me!"_ she groans inwardly to herself, the walls vibrating back and forth, the alarms getting louder and louder, the automaton's voice reaching a fever pitched scream, the countdown sequence still in effect.

"Sixteen... fifteen... fourteen... thirteen..." the countdown continues, the alarms blaring, and her ears starting to hurt.

Sunlight is in sight, as well as the stairs leading back up into the arena. She just has to make it. She just has to make it! Her heart sinks into her chest when the stairs began to fold in on themselves, sinking into the wall in front of it. "No!" Valencia cries out, pushing on harder, faster and faster and faster, her ankles feeling the shockwaves of the floor move beneath her, as the glass shatters behind her.

She reaches the ending of the staircase, the last step just barely hanging on to the outer edge, and she leaps up for it. "Seven... six... five..."

Her feet touch solid ground, and she throws her sword away from her to give her leverage on the ground, as she balances on the edge of the tiled floor and the concrete of the arena. She teeters forward, as her backpack slips off of her shoulders and into the terminal.

"Don't!" she shouts, turning around to grab one of the straps. That backpack has everything in it. The map with her updated position most likely via her tracker, the extra pair of clothing, her sleeping bag, her _food._ One of the bright sunshine yellow straps hangs onto her left hand, her sword hand, it dangling down into the hole, as she tries wrenching it up.

Valencia is too late.

"Two... one... zero..." the countdown finishes.

A boulder from the entrance falls free, as the doors shut in on her backpack, and the rock falls, _falls, and falls,_ onto her left hand, her sword hand, crushing it.

A splash of scarlet soars in the air, and Valencia jerks her head back, screaming and screaming and screaming until every inhabitant in Panem can hear her wail over the mountaintops.

She screams, and screams, _and screams._

* * *

 ** _Linden Hazel: District 7 Male P.O.V (14)_**

* * *

"We have to go there," Peri points at the map, to this gigantic gray blob, unidentified in any other words or indicators, besides the question mark that seems to pulsate whenever they look at it.

Linden swings his axe back and forth, frowning. "Why?" he asks.

She sighs, looking up at the sky, and then over at him. Peri is getting prettier by the minute, he swears, and his heart skips a beat when she looks at him, luscious pools of crystal shining in the sunlight. It is too bad her heart is blacker than the darkest night. "Well, for one, I am sick and tired of being on this hill," she says, and then looks around. Linden is hard pressed to argue; having been on the same spot for a good four or five days at this point - five, he's lost count - and seeing the same, albeit gorgeous view, it has grown a bit tiring, that he can admit. "And, there's four of us left. The Gamemakers are going to push us all together, and we might as well not give them that opportunity. We could die in their attempt, whether it be mutts or fire or whatever."

He shrugs. "Sounds good to me."

Linden does not sleep last night, he stays awake and stares at the stars, watching them flicker from the other side of the see-through arena dome. Peri is sound asleep, lost in LaLa land, probably counting sheep hopping over some stupid fence, but he is incapable of shutting his eyes. He could have died last night, had things not gone the way they did. If the screen didn't flip to Milor, and somehow Carrion's face didn't shine in the sky, it might have been him dying to who knows what. When the tie occurs, he holds his breath in, standing up immediately, axe blade out, and Peri matches him as well, to fight whatever it might be.

However, as Peri says his name in a hushed breath, hitting him on the arm, all his fears and anxieties rush out of the bloodstream in a haze as the screen glitches, all four tallies except his own falling into the Career from Two's column. It is a terrible feeling that washes over him, when that happens, but he tries not to complain. He is still alive, isn't he? And his lucky district partner is alive sitting right next to him; he couldn't be more thrilled.

He knows it has to happen eventually, that it'll happen between now and the final two, that he'll have to kill her. He'll have to, as he wants to go home. He wants Peri cured, sure, but he wants to live more. To taste what fine dining will be like, to sleep in something other than a dried out locker outside Peacekeeper headquarters, and to be given some sort of standard besides the _homeless kid_ title painted across his head in glowing silver paint. He'll do it when Valencia and Milor are both gone, the moment something happens to either Career, he'll swing his axe, and down she'll go. He is secretly hoping, and he knows that wherever his mother is watching him from that she'd be glaring at him, that the leukemia can take her away, that leukemia will do the dirty work _like it was supposed to._

"We can do this," Peri says confidently, tightening the straps of her backpack onto her shoulders. "We just have to work together as a team, taking the two of them on separately."

"Separately?" Linden furrows his eyebrows together. "You think the Career pack broke up?"

"I know they did," she responds. He blinks at her, not getting it. He's never been good with mental math and logic and all of that, never has been. Peri raises an eyebrow to his incredulousness, shrugging. "There were five of us last night, and we had a two-way tie, between you and Valencia. If all three of them were together, they would have all voted unanimously for either you or I and that didn't happen," she lets her axe hang, sliding over the dirt. "They would assume that we were still in an alliance together and would have voted the same, which had been for Valencia. Since there was a tie, they've gone their separate ways. It'd have to be Carrion and Milor together, who voted for you," she scratches her head with her free hand, "And since it was Carrion's face in the sky last night, you know he and Milor were a team. Us against them," she smiles. "Simple."

Linden blinks at her again. "I- I don't get it..."

Peri shakes her head, a telling grin dancing across her lips. "You ready to go?"

"Sure, nothing holding me back," he says.

The two disembark from the hill, heading down the high ovation, probably around two to three hundred feet, he'll guess - he cannot fathom numbers that much higher, he'll be honest - and it feels weird to Linden, his body shifting towards a decline in slope, as his center of gravity shifts. When he lands back onto concrete again, a feeling unexperienced in quite some time, he has to pause for a second, so the soles of his feet could become acclimated once again to the new surfacing.

They get a few steps in, meshing between the grassy hill and the arena's first building, when Peri turns her head back a bit to look at him, they not walking evenly with one another.

"What?" Linden asks, placing his axe behind his head, extending his arms outwards to stretch them, holding onto the hilt.

"I was wanting to ask you about something."

"Like what?"

"Your homelessness," Peri mutters quickly, looking back straight ahead. To their right, as they walk, Linden looks to the left of them, seeing a beautiful botanical garden, but the smell on the air is false, too sweet, and he turns her away from heading into what feels like a death trap.

She has asked him about his mother, his rape, and a few other things, but she's never focused on that in its entirety. Why now? He rubs his arm, lowering the axe back to his side. "You've never asked me about any of that," he says. "Why now?"

"You never told me anything."

" _Because_ you never asked," he reiterates, frowning. What about this is she not understanding? For a moment, however, he is taken out of it, looking at the trees, they walking underneath an aspen grove, a gorgeous array of emerald and halcyon leaves fluttering together, but no signs of any tributes. His body cools a few degrees in the shade, Linden sighing.

"Anything you can tell me?"

As she asks this, Linden can picture it all perfectly in his head. The smells of the burning wood, the smell of smoke rising into the air, choking the clouds, turning their beautiful puffy white into stalwart gray, the feeling of death, of nothingness. There's the tiny sign of the butcher hanging off one hinge, a place Linden frequents, as a few of his close friends distract the scary looking guy with the machete as he takes wild hog from the table behind him, the kids scampering into the bushes like sewer rats after the kill has been taken. There's the old look of home, the rusted out locker that rests on its side after being knocked over in a riot, the edges around burnt black from a Molotov cocktail sent haywire, voices of passing Peacekeepers floating above him. He blends in with the rusted color of the locker through his hair, and the same tattered clothes from three years ago he has on now, so no one notices him.

"Well," he scratches the back of my head, the two continuing their walk, "It was no picnic," Linden sighs, expelling a rush of air. "The day after my mother died, the coroners wanted to put me in the orphanage, but I had heard all the horror stories, and like I said before, I don't think I could have wanted to have any adult that wasn't my mom order me around, so I couldn't do it..." their white gloves inch towards his face, Linden kicks one of them in the nose, breaking it; there's a splatter of scarlet, his feet are on the ground, and Linden _runs._ "I either slept in some rusted out locker underneath the Peacekeeper building, or in people's homes, like in their cupboards and stuff," he laughs lightly, but not too loud in case Milor or Valencia were around. "Sometimes I'd get caught, and I'd scare the people half to death. I was a wanted man by the Peacekeepers back home."

"Oh were you?" Peri laughs with him, and she slows down to match his step, rather than the other way around with having him speed up.

"Talk of the town," Linden grins cheekily. "And obviously, I didn't really bathe. I went hungry some nights, thirsty plenty of times unless it rained... and above all, I just missed my mom, Peri," he presses a hand against his left cheek, forcing pressure down onto his flesh, stopping the tears from forming in their tracks.

"How did you become so strong?" his district partner asks. "You didn't have a serum put in like me, clearly."

Those are distant memories he'll never forget. The jeering schoolboys, or the kids who'd catch him stealing from their parents. The bruises. The black eyes. The fact he has no one to complain to. "Well," he chews on the inside of his cheek, "Sometimes, so I wouldn't starve, I needed to steal food. Steal clothing. Break into homes, simple stuff like that," Peri nods, but her facial expressions tell him it is anything but 'simple stuff', "Just because I'm small and young, doesn't mean I'm invisible. I needed to fight my way out of sticky situations sometimes, when running wasn't an option," Linden locks his jaw, the grip on his axe reflexively tightening. "I didn't go to school, otherwise I'd be caught by teachers and sent away somewhere. However, because I am bored, I'd hang out on the playground, climbing the fence. Kids made fun of me, for smelling like garbage, called me a sewer rat, some knew of my mom's death and bullied me for that... and they'd beat me."

"Oh, Linden..." all of the breath in Peri's lungs flood out with her whisper, and her eyes are distant, cloudy almost.

"Over and over again I'd lose in fights to the older kids, to the taller kids," Linden is looking at a certain spot on the ground, but he isn't physically looking there, but a mutated sphere of crystal shattering over and over again, piercing those bullies throats, making them bleed out onto the concrete. "One day, when I went crying past some old man on the street, headed to my locker, he stopped me," the man has greying hair, gentle, kind, almost pitch-black eyes, and a hand firm and fatherly resting on his shoulder. "He told me to fight back. To get stronger. To train and work out and beat the bullies, because they were insecure."

"And so you did," she finishes for him.

"And so I did," and Linden absentmindedly puffs out his chest, not even knowing he's doing it. "I got to the point where I fought back and I won. I'd beat them. I bullied _them..._ " a hint of arrogance shines through.

"You bullied them back? You beat them up after all they did to you?" Peri's face is that of an objectified horror. He goes to interrupt, but she overrides that. "Linden, that wasn't right."

"That was a few years ago," he says, looking down now, changing from the shattering crystal, and instead focusing on the number of leaves sprouting out of a marigold bush. "It wasn't mature of me, I know, and I've grown since then."

"Linden, I'm-" Peri turns around to face him, extending a hand out to his hold his shoulder.

He grabs her hand instead, gaze solid, jaw locked, and he looks at her straight into the eyes. "Don't apologize to me or for me. It left me with trusting issue, issues I still have," he says, and the joy in his soul dissipates like a phantom's kiss. "Just like how you hate pity, I hate people apologizing to me for things they can't change. Things that they didn't do," and Linden scoffs. "Actually, something you said yesterday kinda made me upset."

"And what was that?" Peri's eyebrows soften, having been pent up together.

"You told me of all the gifts people left you, because of your cancer. All that fruit... all that bread, and all of it going to waste because you couldn't reach it..." he wants to press his hand around her throat, just for a second, to squeeze and hear the _pop!_ "I was starving, having to kill rats and live birds and steal for my food, and you let good shit waste away..." he scoffs again. "I could've had that, I know, but-"

"It was your pride."

He nods, eyes saddening. "Because of my pride, I shot myself in the foot."

"I'm sor-" Peri starts to say, but she bites down hard on her tongue to not finish the sentence through.

Linden is still gripping her hand into the air. "Don't say your sorry for what you can't change," he shakes his head. "You being sorry won't bring my mother back to life. Me being sorry for you can't cure your cancer. Me winning the Games can't bring my mother back to life. You winning the Games can't cure your cancer, either," he is not so sure he even understands what he is saying at this point.

She rather forcefully removes her hand from his iron-like grip at this point, as the last sentence leaves his mouth, and she looks away, a ball forming in her throat. "Actually, Linden..." her voice trails off. "If I win the Hunger Games, I can cure my cancer; I can get treatment for it."

He comes to a stop, as they had been walking when he gripped her hand, and Linden freezes, tilting forward some. Linden looks at her back, as Peri doesn't stop, and she doesn't look back at him.

If _she_ wins.

Not if _he_ wins.

This is not good.

* * *

 ** _Milor Drusus: District 2 Male P.O.V (18)_**

* * *

The world is currently on fire. All he can see is red in his ledger, a cloud of cardinal haze that he cannot blow out of his vision. Wherever Milor looks, he's reminded of Carrion. The way the flowers alongside the concrete paths blow in the wind is of his hair, fingers caressing locks that tangle into knots between the empty spaces of air. How the chilling winds that glide over his skin is the soothing touch of phantom kisses pressed against his arms. The way Milor hooks his wrist and glides up, for how Carrion hooks his wrist and digs deeper, opening caverns he didn't know existed.

The way Milor slams his sword hilt up against a piece of concrete, having grabbed his blade from the sharp edge, the side of the building bursting into multiple pieces, his hands bleeding from the scars and cuts, reminiscent of Carrion's strength. He bandages his hands, the white cloth turning a putrid crimson within minutes, and they need to be swapped out, the moment from before, with the male from Four coming back to haunt him, riding a wave of nausea and sickness - " _Not there!" Carrion shouts, jerking away his feet. "I- I don't like to be touched_ there..." - and the memory dissipates, Milor pressing a bandaged hand to his head to wipe away sweat.

He stumbles from location to location, blindly, in the dark. Valencia takes the map with her, actually, when she left yesterday, leaving him to wander around aimlessly, to seek shelter without knowing what he's getting into, and trying to find three other tributes in some hell house of an arena. Milor trails his sword behind him, not minding the noises it makes on the ground, scratching up the stone, ruining the Gamemakers and their precious creations. It all goes to hell, it all burns, it all should burn down and he should stand on the hill with all the flowers as the scaffoldings shatter and melt.

Milor stops for a drink of water, having a canteen, it almost at the last drop, and he leans his head back against a stone wall, the cold chill causing him to shudder. He's nearing some spot in the arena that he's been to before, when he and Valencia - he skips over Carrion's name, the guy's name is rather irrelevant now, in the plans - come across Colt, the tribute having lost his mind. It is the pathway underneath one of the rollercoasters, wooden actually, a path highlighted through the support system, crossbeams of shade and wood creating x's into the sky.

Carrion, his muse. Carrion, his love. Carrion, his-

"My everything..." Milor mutters to himself.

His father is right, his father has _always_ been right.

Milor can picture him right now, kneeling in front of him, pressing a warm hand against the side of his face, the other hand gripping onto the metal end of the belt that lashes against his head time and time and time again. The feeling of heat enveloping his entire upper half of his body as tears stream out, and he's whooped ten times harder since Drusus' do not cry. Frankie's arms - " _Oh Frankie,_ " Milor gasps, fingers curving around soft flesh as Carrion sleeps soundlessly aside him - holding him tight as he complains and cries into a sandbag, feeling a chaste kiss pressed against the back of his neck.

His father kneels down before him, as Milor gets to his feet, still dragging his sword, water canteen clattering behind him. It's just the sword and him now.

" _You've made quite the mess of yourself, Milor," his father smiles, showing his canines._

 _"I have, haven't I?" Milor replies, looking around at the mess._

 _"Didn't I say this would happen?" he doesn't respond, his father pressing a finger underneath his chin, lifting his head up to look at him square in the eyes. "You better look at me when I speak to you, boy," he says gruffly, ruffling his hair. "I said this would happen, didn't I?"_

 _"You... you did..." the Career mumbles._

 _"You got caught up in that gay thing, didn't you?" the smile vanishes, replaced with a twisted snarl, a wicked sneer. A harsh slap across the face, a hand squeezing around his pale throat, a ribald circle of black and blue bruising that Milor cannot escape from. It's his father! He can't hurt his father! He must respect his father and mother, it is what the Career academy stands on! "I thought I fixed that, didn't I? Didn't I fix your little problem?"_

 _"Yes, father..."_

 _"Wrong!"_

 _Pain flashes across Milor's face, and he collapses onto the concrete. "Father, I-"_

 _"You were always corrupt!" his father kicks him in the side, Milor crying out in pain. "Frankie! Carrion! Andrew! Carlson! All these boys that have corrupted you with their ways, you piece of shit! They've made you blind to the truth..." he grapples at Milor's arms, dragging him upwards, pulling him forward slightly, so he looks at his father in the eyes like he always must. "They've changed your story, Milor," his father whispers. "You aren't kind. You aren't sweet. You are a Career, Milor Drusus. Become what the Capitol created..."_

Milor snaps out of the vision, resting up against one of the wooden supports sticking into the dirt, the heat causing his hair to stick to his face. "Become what the Capitol created..." he mutters under his breath, and he raises his eyes, hearing a hushed voice. A single pair of footsteps. Then... hushed _voices,_ and a second pair of footsteps. "Be the killer I was born to be..." Milor whispers to himself.

Appearing just out of the corner of his eye, the opportunity he's always needed.

He raises his sword, bares his teeth, and screams, running outwards.

Milor races towards Peri and Linden of District 7, their backs turned to him, walking in the same direction he is, to the great unknown, the great beyond of the arena, marked out in gray.

His battle cry alerts the pair, but he doesn't care. All Milor can see is red, after all. Both of them turn in alarm, hands going for their axe belts. Milor reaches them, lashing out his arm, pushing Peri away, she falling back against a post, smashing her head up against it, before falling down into a slump. Not her, he can finish her later. She's not the priority. It's Valencia and Linden. One of them will go, he knows it. He knows it, as he sees it on the screen above him in the sky, with Lewlyn's voice telling the truth, he knows it for sure. Then... _why?_

Then why is it he holds Carrion's bleeding and broken body in his arms? They why is he so broken?

"Peri!" Linden shouts, and he takes a step backwards. Milor keeps one eye on the girl, her axe being knocked out of her hand. He didn't kill her, but he's incapacitated her, and that's all she needed. The boy tries to advance towards his district partner, but he bares his teeth at him, tightening his grip on the sword.

"You!" Milor shouts at him, gaze murderous. "You were supposed to die! It was _you!_ Not Carrion! Not my Carrion!" There are hot tears prickling at his eyes, the haze of the sun appearing in front of him, and that ledger, completely drenched in cardinal. "You took my Carrion from me!"

"No I didn't-" the boy starts.

"I'm going to kill you," he threatens, flipping the sword in his hand, eyes a blazing black, filled to the brim with retribution.

Linden locks his jaw, gaze snapping with his. "I've fought worse than you. I've fought scarier."

"I'm the worst of them all, then."

"I've fought worse than you, Milor," and a slight glow appears in his eyes. A telling. A... mockery. "And I've beaten them too."

"Oh, I _fucking_ doubt that!" Milor roars, and his trigger snaps.

He leaps forward, slashing downwards in a silver arc. Linden sidesteps nimbly, the Career's eyes having given away his position and where he is heading towards. Milor ends up empty, no dead boy on his side, twirling around faster than any animal the boy from Seven has ever hunted, slashing again with his sword. Linden raises his axe to block it, their metal weapons colliding, a godawful noise like a gong reverberating underneath the structure. Peri stirs in her spot, but she doesn't seem to make anymore movements.

That is the moment Milor needs, however, as Linden looks to his right for a split second to check on her, Milor adding to the pressure, kicking out his leg, slamming it as hard as he can into Linden's knee. The boy cries out in pain, collapsing under his own weight, still holding onto his axe however, and Milor brings his own weapon with him. He swings the sword down again, Linden catching it with the hilt of the axe, the blade digging dangerously close to his sternum. The boy grunts in surprise when he manages to hold up the weapon, as Milor's losing his footing behind him, the soles of his feet, scuffing at the gravel, while the light beams dance dangerously above his head.

The sword gives way slightly, cutting into Linden's shoulder, and he cries out, but Milor's sword slips from his grasp a bit too much. He grapples for the weapon quickly, snarling. "Die! Die! Die! Die!" he chants over and over again, bringing the blade back down towards him, Linden rolling out of the way and into another wooden post. Milor leaps back to his feet as Linden swings his own axe blade out in a likewise silver arc, barely catching tandem onto a piece of loose cloth sticking out of Milor's tribute uniform. The two boys stand in front of one another again, Milor coming from his left this time.

Linden parries the blow, swinging up with the axe blade. The Career dodges out of the way just in time, the leather hilt of the weapon hitting the side of his face, but not enough to deter him. The temperature of the arena seems to rise another thousand degrees as the two boys fight. Milor presses a hand against his cheek, the warm feel of blood spreading over a reopened cut spilling down his face. _Good._ Blood means motivation. Motivation means victory. He slashes out again, causing Linden to fall back unexpectedly onto the ground, his axe falling out of his hand and onto the ground.

Milor rushes in with a stab, but the boy is quicker than what he gives him credit for, catching, just barely, the skin on the ankle. Linden yelps at this finally, a cry of pain releasing from his lips. Music to Milor's ears. However, before he can retract the blade, Linden kicks at the boy's hand holding onto the hilt of the weapon, slamming with his own full force into a knuckle, it breaking underneath the kick. Milor swallows his scream behind his tongue, wrenching his hand back, but he does not dare bring the injured appendage up to be looked at. Linden uses that opportunity to crawl towards Peri's weapon, her axe blade glittering off the sunlight. He holds onto it, and curving his body, throws it at Milor.

He ducks underneath the throw, Linden now having his axe behind the Career, and Peri's as well. Linden gets to his feet, picking up a rock about the size of Milor's calf, that rock having rested against one of the posts. Out of the corner of Milor's eyes, he can see the girl starting to come to her senses, but still, no weapon, and he can finish her the moment he finishes Linden, the little brat. Milor screams another battle cry, slashing out with his sword, Linden dodging back again, the boy swinging with reckless abandon, no form to his attacks, all his academic training fleeting him, as all he can hear is those bullets ripping Carrion to shreds, and all he can see is that ledger covered in vermillion.

A cry sticks in his throat, unable to be freed, as Milor swings, his blade colliding with one of the coaster's wooden support posts, instead of flesh like he expects, the blade getting stuck in the wood, he incapable of wrenching it free as well. Linden balks his tongue in his throat, gripping onto the stone, and he brings it up to Milor's head, smashing it against the side of his skull.

Milor collapses underneath the blow, the air in his lungs expelling out in one rush. He drops to the ground, breathing shallow, blade still stuck in the wooden post, glittering off of the sunlight.

" _Carrion..." he whispers, blood frothing at his lips._

 _His dead boyfriend crouches down in front of him, a white and serene halo shining behind him. "Hey, gorgeous. You hanging in there?"_

 _"Carrion, I-"_

 _"Remember," Carrion presses his head up against Milor's, their breathing in sync. "I'm yours, and you're mine. Right?"_

 _"Always..." Milor feels the prickling of hot tears in his eyes._

 _"Always, Milor. So, let go. Join me, darling."_

 _"I- I can't," his lips are dry, his throat is on fire, and his skull is killing him. "I haven't died, Carrion, I can't join because-"_

"Stay away from me!" Linden's scream disrupts the tranquility of the Career's vision. "And _fucking_ stay away from Peri!" Several drops of blood trickle down Milor's face, warm. This warmth means defeat. This warmth means disappointment. This warmth means death.

Linden brings the rock down against Milor's skull again, and again, and again, and again, until there's a resounding _CRACK!_

Milor's world goes dark, and like his ledger, Carrion's ghost drowns in a tide of unrelenting crimson.

* * *

 ** _Peri Florence: District 7 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

Her head is killing her. Peri's vision is blurry, an odd spot of pain blooming in the back of her skull, spreading like wildfire to the rest of her cranium, she touching the skin there gingerly, but her fingers do not come back tinted with copper. The last she remembers is hearing Milor scream at them, and someone's arm, whether it be Milor's or Linden's, push her out of the way, she colliding with the post.

She grunts in pain, struggling to her feet. When the spots in her vision clear, and her breathing returns to a semi-normal place, all the water in her mouth dries up. Her axe blade is over a bit, tossed into the dirt, up against a post. Linden! Where's- where's _Linden..._ where's her district partner? Her hands feel stuffy, gripping around the edge of the axe, the leather rough on her skin. As she rights herself, out of the corner of her eye, he appears clearly, standing straight up, unmoving.

"Linden?" Peri frowns.

Her district partner looks up at her, and her heart stops. His face is caked in blood, hair disheveled, bleeding from several wounds on his leg and shoulder. The rock in his hand is coated with blood as well, it glittering off of the individual grooves that reflect sunlight. His blood. Her blood. _Milor's blood._ A breath catches in her throat, Linden looking down at the rock, and then over at Milor Drusus's now dead body, he turned side face to look at the sun, teal eyes wide, unblinking, he unmoving, a crater practically resting on the side of his skull. He drops the rock to the ground, as if it is radioactive, it clunking to the sidewalk with a thud.

"Linden, look at me," she repeats.

He falls back, up against another post, moving out of the way of the sword that is sticking outwards, his chest rising and falling rapidly as he hyperventilates. She matches up to him, trying not to look at Milor as best as she can. She grapples onto his own hands, holding them tight. "I- I killed him..." Linden repeats over and over again, he unable to tear away his eyes at the dead Career. "Peri, he just- and I just- I killed him, Peri!"

"It was him or us, Linden," Peri tells him, pressing a hand against the back of his head. She's happy to know, whilst looking at him, that he's okay, and she's still armed. She's still armed with that gladius from before, when she fought Marcus at the Cornucopia, when he had an arrow pointed to Linden's neck. There's a chance. Forgo the axe blades. "Linden, it's okay..."

"Peri, I _killed_ him."

"There's nothing more you could have done!"

"Peri, I-"

She shushes him, pressing a hand against his face. "Linden, we can do this. We just- we have to go, and let the Capitol get his body. You saved us, Linden. If you didn't kill Milor, we'd both be dead, okay?" he wantonly moves into the touch, her fingers drumming against his pulse, calmed by the quiet, yet present beat that thrums his skin. "It's just Valencia left. You and I against Valencia. It's just Valencia." and then in her head, " _It's me and Valencia. Just me and Valencia..._ " she thinks, rather sharply.

Peri goes through with it.

Linden gasps, his eyes widening, and the wounds seem to darken everywhere.

Peri leans into him, they having stepped away from the post, back onto the solid ground. "I'm not sorry," she whispers in his ear, one hand holding onto the tangible bits of his hair, the bits that smell like sunlight and sunshine and rainbows, and Linden. Dilapidated lockers with rust, and sex, and a prostitute's fringy piece of black lingerie, the silk stockings and the sulfur, all of the smoke. Tears pour down her face as the other hand thrusts in the gladius further into Linden's heart. "Please, please forgive me, Linden," she begs.

He tries to claw at her, anything really, as she lowers him to the ground, tears spilling out of both of their eyes. He's in pain, she can tell, but it is her and Valencia. She's planned on it, she's always planned on it. Linden lays down on the ground, she atop him. Peri presses her lips to his, one last kiss, one last moment of warmth. One more moment of solidarity and security. It has to happen now, otherwise she couldn't do it when it is just her and him alone, when the survivors are dead. "Forgive me, Linden..." she shakes her head.

A single drop of blood pours out of his mouth, those eyes dark and full of hate, fall of sadness and zero understanding. "I never should've trusted you..." he whispers, shaking his head with what little bit of life force he might have. "I should've killed you when I had the chance..."

She backs away from in a panic, all the air in her lungs freezing up solid, and Peri's back hits one of the posts, she looking at both Milor and Linden's dead bodies lying up against one another. Linden's words echo inside her eardrum, and then, the tears do fall freely. She never loved him, she never wanted him, and she's not sorry. She cannot be sorry. She cannot give Linden Hazel pity, she forbids it.

Somewhere, a cannon fires.

On day nine, there were four souls dedicated to die.

Now, on the tenth day, two remain.

The 100th Hunger Games, the 4th Quarter Quell... it is time to come to a close.

* * *

 **4th: Milor Drusus, District 2 Male, 18. Killed by Linden Hazel. Created by Alecxias. Oh my Milor, what a character you were. I honestly don't know, out of the two deaths that occurred in this chapter, which one really I am going to be hurt more by. I took Carrion away from you, and in the end, you suffered, in the name of love, and I think that had Carrion been with you in the end, or at the very least, final three, you could've won it. Ya'll, I loved Milor, and you all loved him, for he was everything Careers usually aren't: nice, kind, charming, sweet, effective, but most of all, I feel, personal. You could identify in his struggles, or empathize to some level, I feel. Him dying was something I planned - he had never been a top two choice - but I never knew how I wanted him to go. This was hard for me to do, but once I wrote it, I had to stick to my guns. Milor, thank you for even existing.**

 **3rd: Linden Hazel, District 7 Male, 14. Killed by Peri Florence. Created by Keadon. Like Annabellina from goldie031, Linden was supposed to be a tribute of mine in an SYOT I did two years ago, where I actually had him winning. However, when I accepted him here, I knew I couldn't let him win, it just wouldn't be fair. I cannot think of a single reader, reviewer, or submitter who has disliked Linden - Peri, yes, and probably worse with this end - but I had it in the back of my mind that either he or she would die by killing the other, after getting so close to one another, and after admitting so much, and to the point where they've even had sex. If anyone is a Romeo and Juliet story, with all the candidates in this piece, then they take the cake. Like Milor, I fell in love with Linden from Day One, from POV One, and I have to say goodbye. I do hope it was as much of a shock to ya'll as it was to me when I thought about it. Linden, you broke my heart, you _bastard._**

* * *

 _ **Tribute List (Boy - Girl)**_

District 1: **Valencia Shale** [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]

District 7: **Peri Florence** [ _Submitted by LordShiro_ ]

* * *

 ***takes deep breath* Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #44: Four Souls to Die, where our final four in the arena have been brought down to two. I've got a lot to go over, so bear with me. First, may I say, with a huge round of applause how happy and excited I am, because, ya'll, this is huge... this is the first time in my entire fanfiction lifespan, as Sheep Led to Slaughter is my fifth attempt at an SYOT, that this story was the first to breach reapings - none of my other SYOTS ever got past the reapings -, train rides, tribute parade, training, private sessions, interviews, the night before, Bloodbath, and I've actually reached the FINAL TWO! Ya'll, I want a damn cake, and I want a damn celebration because that is unbelievable.**

 **Secondly, we say goodbye to Milor and Linden, deaths that I can't believe I just wrote, but there's always upsets in SYOTS, I imagine. Another pairing where a district partner kills the other - Caiden poisoned Alexandra, and Peri has stabbed Linden - and that leaves us with Valencia Shale from District 1, and Peri Florence from District 7, and at this point, it is anyone's game. After heavy, _heavy_ \- ya'll, I stayed awake with this - deliberation, I've decided my victor, but obviously we must reach there first. These two ladies always entertained my top eight, and actually my top five, but originally neither were going to be my top two - it was a tie between Caiden v. Maisey, or Annabellina v. Persephone at one point, actually - but again, here we are.**

 **Thirdly, next chapter, Chapter #45: Their House of Cards, is another OC Capitol storyline chapter, but the rule of how no one is safe in the arena for these tributes is going to bleed over to the Capitol and their shenanigans; no one's safe. Not Bonnie, not Calhoun, not Rennie, not _anyone._ Fair reminder. Chapter #46: Victories in the Fire, will be our last arena chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter where I will crown a victor, but don't expect too much out of it, since my action writing isn't clearly the greatest, but it'll be my best foot forward.**

 **Please, oh please, as I can sense it now, review. I imagine there are so many thoughts you want to discover and find out, and I'd be honored to hear them. Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope to all see you soon for Chapter #45: Their House of Cards, which I am aiming for an update on Wednesday, the 7th, if all goes well. We're at the end, and the time is up. Thanks for reading; thanks for reviewing! Have a great day everyone! I love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	45. Their House of Cards (Capitol Plot XIV)

**Hey everybody, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #45: Their House of Cards. Ya'll, this is major, as we are continuing the OC storyline for the Capitol characters, the precursor to where I will choose a victor, in #46, and I cannot be more excited, how we're there, we're almost there, and then the Capitol plot will finish up in four chapters after that, we're six chapters away from the end, guys, and I cannot wait! Just have to type it all, lol. This chapter will have four different scenes, but in no way will it be as long as any of the arena chapters, just a lot of plot to get through is all. Enjoy Chapter #45: Their House of Cards.**

* * *

 ** _President of Panem Calhoun Rodney P.O.V_**

* * *

Sunlight streams through the blinds, falling on Calhoun's face. He smiles to himself as the bands warm his skin. He's still dressed in his suit from the night before, having been too exhausted to change out of it, plopping rather unceremoniously on the bed next to Bonnie, who is sound asleep in her usual spot, a bright pink mask placed over her eyes, she wrapped up in a bathrobe and the sheets, that were recently washed, smelling of lavender when he places them up to his nose to inhale a whiff. Calhoun rubs at his eyes blearily, wiping the excess dredges of gunk and tiredness off, flinging them into the halos.

He rolls out of bed, rather getting up, feeling the exhaustion sink in his veins, down to the soles of his feet, filling in the empty spaces of his Achilles heel and sighing with relief as he stretches. Calhoun sits up, dark hair a tumbled mess, and the rays now fall onto Bonnie, highlighting her lemonade waves instead. She stirs as the shadows are replaced with flares, and he gets to his feet. He yawns, trying to stifle the noise. The rest of the evening, last night, is all a blur. After his wife presses a hand against the side of his face, calm and sensuous, warm and delicate, he wanders around in a daze around the mansion, speaking to affiliates and colleagues and citizens, but there is not much being remembered inside his head. He shakes the hand of some Peacekeeper official who has mastered the eight-hundred-and-fifty ways of flaying skin off of someone's pinkie. Calhoun nearly pukes into his drink, and has other Peacekeepers - oh, the irony, he laments to himself, how the boss is dragged away via the hands of peons - grab the man by the shoulders, removing him, screaming and cursing from the hall. The man will lose the skin on his pinkies in some holding cell somewhere.

Calhoun holds the tablecloth in his hands, unable to let go, as the man's curses and screams are louder and louder the farther he gets down the hall, and the way his dinner guests stare at the president in fear, unable to bring themselves to comment on the disturbances. He presses the edge of a napkin up against his lips to wipe away the blood spilling out from behind the veil, as he bites down on the inside of his cheek to stem the nausea churning in his stomach. Calhoun has known himself to have a gentler heart, to take pity on the less unfortunate, but in a position of power, he's come to terms with the fact that to keep said power, he must enforce his hand from time to time. Someone as nonchalant as that Head Peacekeeper, a man whose name he didn't catch - irrelevant to him now, actually - talking about the punishment of citizens, citizens he rules... someone not fit in his inner circle. After the skin is removed and the man is crying in a ball, a sight Calhoun _wants_ to see, he's entertaining having the man turned into an Avox, tongue removed and all. While he is absent, someone else will be pushed into the spot of Head Peacekeeper for whatever district he hails from - Eleven, if he recalls correctly - and someone hopefully less bloodthirsty.

Bloodthirsty, huh?

He tosses a glance over at Bonnie. Isn't she the most bloodthirsty of them all? Is it Lewlyn? Would it be himself for allowing the Games to go on?

"Is it me for sanctioning the Hunger Games?" Calhoun whisper to himself, he standing at the closest windowsill, fingers drumming on the tiled ledge. "Am I the bloodthirsty one?"

The sound of sheets scuffling drag his attention back to the bed, Calhoun wiping at his nose. Getting a cold, perhaps. Bonnie lifts the mask off of her eyes and places it on top of her head, revealing those stunning diamond eyes of hers, sunlight glinting off of them, and his heart is taken to a different dimension. Despite their fights, despite their scuffles, despite their differences... he loves her, his wife is his everything, and the child inside of her is his now, someone he'll have to take care of. Bonnie is just as beautiful on day 2000 as she was on the very first day he met her, sitting down on a Capitol fountain's outer rim, and he isn't looking where he's going, bumping into her, sending her book that she's reading into the water.

Oh how she chewed his head off, and he stood there, relishing in the fact some other girl gave him a second glance, gave him any attention at all.

"Good morning, honey," she says, stretching her arms out, rolling onto the side to look at him.

"Good morning to you too, darling," he sits down on the edge of the bed, brushing a strand of blonde hair out of her face, leaving his palm there.

She reaches up and grabs the other hand, squeezing it. "Today's the day, huh?"

"That it is," Calhoun takes a deep breath. "The final two."

The importance of what this sunrise in particular represents cannot be overstated, and even as Calhoun thinks about it, his skin begins to crawl, and goosebumps rise to the surface like volcanoes sprouting under the seafloor. The final two in the Hunger Games, a group of twenty-four reduced down to two measly tributes fighting to survive, now at the ends of their rope, desperate to make it home. It means that an arena that has months and months of effort poured into is effectively decimated and left to rot in a gigantic pile of rust. It is the end of a Quarter Quell, too, something that makes Calhoun's heart beat in his chest a thousand times stronger than usual. Either the tributes could fight in one spectacular explosion of hatred, violence, and blood where the audience is satisfied, or it can end in a soft thud like someone landing on carpet, where starvation takes away the loser, or an infection and there isn't a single ounce of blood shed... it could define him, the legacy.

"Legacy..." he whispers to himself again, but this time so impossibly soft that Bonnie would never hear him, even if she is pressed right up to his side.

Today is the largest day in Calhoun's life. More than when he marries the woman whose hair he's running his fingers through. More than the day he is elected, that moment televised nationwide. Today might be the last day in Panemian history when a tribute is forced to fight for their life in an arena, the last day a tribute will die in some government sanctioned arena, and he's the one in charge of it all.

For the occasion, it is Career Valencia Shale from District 1, and the faded flower, a Capitol epithet, Peri Florence from District 7.

Bonnie rolls over onto her back, his fingers losing hold of her face, and she extends her arms out behind her head. Calhoun rights himself back off the bed, going to the dresser mirror, fingers dancing through the locks of his hair. "You slept in your clothes?" she asks.

"Too tired to change."

"You cannot go outside like that."

"You still commanding the president of Panem on what he can and cannot do?" A slight smirk edges itself out, and he gives her side-eye in the mirror.

"Yes, I am," Bonnie sits up straight, smiling back at him. "I will always tell what my husband what he can and cannot do."

"Well, I think my clothes are fine, just not my hair," he says, brushing a few strands and tucking them up at his scalp, rubbing his cheeks with his palms to bring blood back up to them, dragging out the dark lines underneath his eyes, the bags that speak of sleep deprivation, of nights when he hears the blades rise and fall, stabbing into bodies. How little lambs with gorgeous faces are covered in scarlet, but Calhoun looks away from the mirror whenever one of those thoughts pop into his head.

Bonnie runs a hand through her hair as well, shaking it back and forth. She lets out a faint laugh, enough to perk his attention.

"What?" he asks, turning around to look at her.

"You know what's funny?"

"What is?" Calhoun furrows his eyebrows together.

She pushes the covers off of her, revealing her pajamas that she slept in, which are almost chromatic white, to the point where they mesh together with the sheets and he cannot see where her feet end and her torso begins. "Whose our final two tributes today?"

"The girl from One, and the girl from Seven," he says, and his wife laughs again. "Bonnie, what's so funny about that?"

"Well, you think it'd be a battle between Valencia and Peri, but it's actually a battle between you and I."

He crosses his arms, frowning. "I- I don't follow."

Bonnie sighs, rolling her eyes, tucking her knees to her chest, resting her arms on top. "Valencia has been my favorite tribute since the training scores, and Peri is your favorite tribute. Our two favorites going head to head for the crown."

Calhoun shakes his head, going back to the mirror. He'll force himself to look at the sheep led to slaughter, he'll force himself to stare at Rennie's blackened and burnt to a crisp tongue sitting inside a tiny box. He does not have time to deal with this. "Peri is not my favorite, Bonnie," he straightens his tie. "I don't have favorites."

"No?" Bonnie's tone is questioning, she raising an eyebrow. Her defiance is brilliant, absolutely brilliant. "What would you call it, then? You gave her a strength serum didn't you? Invincibility, immortality, all of that, right?"

"Peri is not invincible, nor is she immortal. The girl is still dying of cancer!"

His voice echoes around the room in a violent shout, the walls shaking, and Bonnie draws the sheets closer to her, hugging them tight to her body, restricting her breathing. "I know, honey," she says, after a lapsed moment of silence, their breathing matching likewise as Calhoun rubs his face with his hands, shaking his head.

"I'm sorry," he apologizes. "I- I shouldn't have yelled."

"No, you shouldn't have," Bonnie retorts back, throwing off the covers, stepping down onto the floor. She makes his way over to him, crossing round front, but he isn't even looking at her. He cannot remember the last time the two of them slept in the same bed together, he always falling asleep in the office, or on the couch, where his tie is half undone, laying in an odd ball in the center of his chest, mouth wide open with drool sliding down his chin, pooling on the leather seat that has a tear down the middle. He cannot remember the last time he realistically put his hands on her, made her wanton with the lust for him, but here she is now, prowling towards him. "But, it's okay," she says, reaching him in the time he reminisces. "You're stressed."

His heart is a gray center, beating but black, bruised yet shining. Hers is a more wicked shade of crimson, tangled in barbed wire, with thorns jutting out from the arteries that reveal themselves.

Calhoun holds her hand in his. "It's showtime, sweetheart."

"I'll see you at the Gamemaker Center," Bonnie pats his face, rubbing the stubble, her fingers gliding over coarse sandpaper, he relishing in the fact she's touching him again. "Make sure to eat something before you go."

"Of course, Bonnie," he kisses her on the forehead. "Where would I be without you sometimes, huh?"

"Dead, maybe," she jokes back, returning his kiss with her own, their lips colliding in a mess of sunshine and lavender and warped shouts that are strangely bitter, like too much pepper poured into a soup.

Calhoun sighs, the rage from a few moments ago sinking back into the blue of his bloodstream. He shouldn't have yelled. He doesn't know why he yelled, but perhaps, frankly, it might not even matter. He finishes tying the knot for this tie, making the way to the door of the bedroom, the bedroom being the farthest room of the mansion to the outer porches, to hide from the paparazzi and the blizzard-esque flashes of the cameras.

"I love you, Bonnie," he calls back at her, Bonnie having directed herself at the mirror now, untangling her hair like a rolling tumbleweed. He leaves his blazer, it laying slumped over a chair in the corner, and he'll miss it, but Calhoun doesn't care. He's running late anyways.

He does not notice how Bonnie does not say ' _I love you_ ' back in reply, as he's out the door already.

* * *

 ** _Lance Viel: Victor of the 79th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

"You shouldn't do that," Lance reprimands Kevia, he digging into his fingernails with a toothpick.

Kevia looks over at him, face all done up, cheeks powdered, some disgustingly hideous shade of eggplant lipstick smeared over her lips, a swathing dark line of black eyeshadow accentuating the sinister quality of her sneer. She drags on the butt of the cigarette, extending it outwards and clenching it tight with her middle and pointer finger of her left hand, she sitting down on the stone rim of one of the fountains. "Do what?"

"Smoke," he says, eyes meeting hers, calcite grays and sharply cut emeralds, musky waves of sunshine and discombobulated tuffs of dung, a battle of spear and sword. "It's bad for the plants," and he loses focus on her, trying to swipe a few granules of sand out from under his thumb. The toothpick digs at his skin, poking, piercing, but never wounding. He doesn't bleed anymore, as the Games drew all of it out of him years ago.

The two victors are in the presidential garden passing the time, a large, voracious sprawling five acre plot of shrubbery and trees connecting the mansion to the Gamemaker Center. They will not spend their time in the Viewing Center, watching behind some silver monitor as the final two tributes battle it out. Well, Kevia won't spend her time there, the mentors of the final two surviving victors must be with the administration watching it all fall to pieces.

The female victor taps the edge of her cigarette, a lone ash spiraling from the paper stick of death and into the fountain with no splash to announce its arrival. She brings the cigarette back to her lips for another puff. "Well, you being near me, your presence, is bad for my mental health..."

"Knock it off," Lance rolls his eyes, still stabbing, still prickling. One granule comes free, tumbling down his pant leg like a boulder free from its brethren, to crush an unsuspecting village below. "You didn't survive the Hunger Games as a teenager to die of lung cancer as an adult."

"By smoking one cigarette?" Kevia raises an eyebrow, it bleached and tanned in the sunlight. He thinks she looks absolutely ridiculous, but his opinion has never had much merit in the way she holds herself, and he is not about to start now. "Besides, I didn't survive the Hunger Games," another eye roll from Lance. It is her motto, it is Kevia's mantra, that she won. That victors _win_ the Games, not simply _survive._ There are some tributes who are pathetic and do not have a spine that sometimes pull out victories, but not her, not any Career, of course. "I won the Hunger Games, Lance. Just like you."

"I won because an ally of mine eliminated all the rest of us. All the threats," he says, unblinking. If he focuses hard enough on one of the hedges that are a few feet away, it being an entryway into a path of roses, a mix of red, black, and white roses all with their sharp thorns, he can see his district partner's face in the woven style of the leaves. Not the botanist's fault of course. "After I killed him, the rest were fourteen or younger kids from the outer districts."

"I know," Kevia exhales, an exhaust pipe emission of smoke, hazy in the sun, ejecting from her lips, streaming towards the cosmos in a direct line. "You never stop telling me. We've all heard it," she grinds the cigarette into the stone of the fountain, then flicking the bud somewhere, but his gaze doesn't follow it. He's bearing his eyes straight at her, and he brandishes the toothpick like a knife, it jutting out slightly behind the clamped fist of his hand. He hasn't armed himself like that in... well, he's not sure. "We've all heard of the nightmares you have, and how Carissa got her throat slit or smothered or something awful..." she wipes away at the smoke. "Lance, you're still here, and you can't change the past like that, so stop talking about it."

He raises a knee, leaning on it with his elbow, any naturalness in his face hiding behind a malicious sneer, and he still brandishes the toothpick outwards like a dagger. "Why are you being such a bitch this morning? Bitchier than normal, at the very least."

She swirls her tongue around in her enclosed jaw, he seeing it jut at the corners of cheeks every few seconds, probably biting down on it too. "This is just how I am. And if you don't like it," Kevia shrugs. "Too bad."

"A backstabbing bitch," Lance smirks to himself, crossing his arms, still resting one elbow on his knee. "First Hale, now me. Who you going to fuck with next?"

Kevia's eyes flash a dangerous thunderstorm gray, but the look in her eyes is held back. Cautionary. Incendiary. He's seen it before, that look in her eyes, as if her body has survived some sickening disease that brought her ribcage up and out of her mouth. He's seen it when, three years ago, the girl from One makes the final five, but due to an injury sustained in a fight at the Cornucopia with another female Career trying to become Alpha Dog that it blinds her in her right eye - the girl's good eye, if he recalls - nearly falls to her death after walking straight off a cliff, that the girl tries grabbing onto some branch, but her hands barely miss it and she plummets down to her death, her scream echoing the entire time. Lance remembers seeing it two years ago at New Years Party back home in the Mayor's residence, where he's pressed up against her in the broom closet, his lips on her neck, her hand down his shirt, and then he sees the scar as he undresses her, the scar that circles her left breast from when some deranged psychopath after she makes it home digs a knife into her chest, going to cut the flesh off in a circular pattern, getting about a third of the way there before she manages to wrench the knife out of her and slit his own throat with it.

 _"He wanted a piece of me," she tells him, huddled against him later that evening, the two cooped up by a fire. "Wanted to mount me on a wall, because I murdered his nephew in the Games," a perceptible shake of her head. "Argus wasn't his nephew, and Argus didn't die by my hand. He died of dysentery and-" the rest breaks off into a sob._  
 _Lance has seen that look before._

A look of instant regret.

She draws herself closer together, bringing one knee to her chest so she can hug it. "I didn't..." she begins to say, the rest being mumbled by her pant leg.

"What was that?" Lance raised an eyebrow.

Kevia lifts her head so her chin rests on top of her knee. "I never betrayed Hale to Bonnie," she looks at him, and there's a tear or two prickling at the corners of her eyes. "I didn't want to get punished for stealing from her, so I let her know about Lewlyn freeing her brother, Rennie from her services, but she already knew that," Kevia swallows, and he watches this movement. "So, I thought about the gossip between Pollux and Rennie, about them possibly sleeping together, and Bonnie knew that too, because Pollux told her the very next day," she shakes her head up at the sky. "Bonnie told me to find her something, and so I was going to tell her about Hale and Arizona, but I never finished writing the letter," the victor looks over at Lance, and his heart skips a beat. The look in her eyes is of wild abandonment, where dark circles like to hide and fester; he's never seen this from her. "I was never going to betray Hale and Arizona... never..." she rasps.

Lance gets to his feet, walking over to her, and then crouches in front of her, taking her hands in his. "Kevia, I do not know why you think Bonnie has all this political weight. She doesn't! She has no say in this government, and you don't need her approval. You don't need her blackmail."

"I want it..." Kevia wipes at her nose. "I don't know why I thought doing that to Hale was right, but I just..."

He softens his grip on her wrists. "You, me, Hale, Ari, and Hector, the five of us... we're all a team, Kevia. We've all gone through the Hunger Games and have stuck by each others sides," Lance leans in, inhaling the scent of her, a mix of lemongrass and fuchsia, an odd combination to say the least. "We have a chance today, with Valencia, to finally get a victor for the Careers. We cannot have us divided, where it is Hale and Ari and Hector against you and I because you wanted someone's favor."

The victor shakes her head, a lump forming in her throat. "You- you don't understand, Lance. I want Bonnie's approval, more than anything, and if I don't send something to her, I don't know what she'll do."

"Then lie!"

"I'm not good at that!" she barks back at him.

Lance's heart sinks into his chest, and he lets go of Kevia's wrists, rising back up to form, the sunshine warm on his back. He cannot, for the life of him, fathom a good reason for any of this. For how they constantly build up this house of cards, to watch it crumble, crumble, _crumble_ underneath the weight of all the lies, and the backstabbing, and the betrayals, all to get the opinions and respect of the people in power who have put them through the turmoil of fighting to death in an arena. "Valencia's a beautiful girl, Kevia. Strong. Kind. Well-hearted," he bites on his tongue, having dropped the toothpick on the ground. He'd like to jam it between Kevia's tongue and teeth, leave it there to rot. "How could someone like her not have been tainted by you, yet?"

She looks up at him, the tears in her eyes very true, and very fresh, tears spilling down her cheeks, crystalline waves of emotions. "Lance, what? I-"

"I don't believe you," he says, and she nearly falls into the fountain. "I don't believe that you wouldn't have ratted Hale and Ari out. You're too obsessed with power, you're too obsessed with fame and fortune..." he chokes on the next statement. "I don't even know who you are anymore..."

His heart breaks in two, Kevia sobs harder, and their house of cards continues to tumble down.

* * *

 ** _The One Who Will Forever Be Mute_**

* * *

Being in her office sends chills up his spine, and Rennie has to set the box down on the table else he'll drop it. It is empty for the day, she not going to arrive for a few more hours until the fireworks begin, but even though Bonnie Rodney is not present in the room at that moment, he can still feel her, Rennie can feel the way her presence wafts from corner to corner, fogging up the windows, creating halos of dust around the chandelier above. He hugs the crate of folders to his chest, sighing deeply. After all that has happened between he and her, and between he and his sister, and between he and Pollux... Rennie thinks it might be the time to end it all, to retire out of the Capitol's service. Become a private citizen again.

Hell, he could move. Move to District 1 and smell the jade in his tea. Move to District 9, get fat on barely and oats. Move to District 13 and choke on the smog on the air, destroyed twice now, never to return.

In the box is a pile of folders, some with spilled coffee on the edges of them, the corners ripped up and curving inward, someone pushing on the tabs too hard. With the Games coming to a close - _finally,_ he exasperates to himself, exhausted from hearing Lewlyn complain about every other thing with the arena going wrong - there will be no need for the dome, no need for Bonnie's services until the next arena. " _There'll never be a next arena,_ " he reminders himself sharply, of the promise he makes to his sister, where he wants to hold her tight and never let her go. In the folders are spreadsheets compiled of data about all of the tributes, about every single tree and plant that make the floral landscape of the structure, of the genetic input sequencing in the mutt's designs... every minute detail goes in the folder, all for Bonnie's records, as she has put it on herself to do this, rather than make it Lewlyn's job, but he appreciates that. Lewlyn cannot organize for the life of her, and Rennie thinks, rather darkly, that is why he is forced to be _her_ Avox, because her place would never become clean if he didn't do it.

Rennie hasn't seen Bonnie since the day she barges into his closet space office, accusing of him treason and in messing up the mutt's data. He has to smirk to himself when she leaves, because she's dead on the money, right as she could ever be, but no one would suspect him of ever doing something like that? Who'd believe the cripple, the mute, the one tortured and brought to heel to have any agenda of his own? Rennie knows himself, however, and knows that he did what he did just to get back at Bonnie, back at the woman he used to think had been the elixir between life and death, drinking her in all of her splendor, all of her glory, since she somehow believes she could drive a wedge between he and Lewlyn.

He does not mind her for anything else, liking her company, liking her look, but it is that right there that has pushed him away from her forever, a moment in time that cannot be fixed. He's heard her shout at his sister numerous times that there is no way Lewlyn could ever make amends for what she's done to him, and in some instances she might be right, but Rennie is incapable of doing that, of thinking in that manner ever again, so he leaves it be... Bonnie will never be able to make amends to him about what she's done to separate family from family... that is unforgivable. She'll never be able to fix the burnt bridge.

Even after the birth.

The sound of someone's dressed shoes on the tile cause Rennie to lift his head, he having been sifting through the folders with his fingers, but not opening any of them. Too many memories of testing those mutts on some poor stuffed animal, or the occasional Capitol prisoner, hearing their screams echo around the chamber, as blood splatters the mirror in front of them, with Bonnie grinning sadistically, rubbing her hands together.

Rennie turns around, eyes bearing straight into Pollux Aetos, the Master of Ceremonies, he holding in his hands a crate likewise to the mute's. He knows what's in that crate; they'd be transcripts of every correspondence Pollux has had with Lewlyn, Calhoun, or the tributes in regard to the Games. Again, for the records. To make the Quarter Quell in history, everything must be documented.

Neither man move for a minute, both just staring at one another, the air starting to still, starting to make him tear up and choke on the scent of sex.

Pollux clears his throat first, and Rennie digs inside the crate for his tablet. No one else is really bothering with the using of Panemian Sign Language to communicate - not that Rennie expects anyone to actually pay him attention, but it's a force of habit now - and he brings it along with him wherever he goes in case someone wishes to converse, but that's rarer than he magically growing his tongue back. "Morning, Rennie," the other guy greets, hair slicked back with gel, contacts put in so Pollux's eyes are an alarmingly gorgeous shade of liquidous turquoise. Rennie kicks himself; he mustn't get focused! Not again, not like before! "Bonnie, uh, asked me to drop these off by her office before the end today. I figured yours would've been dropped by earlier."

He can't do this.

He can't do this with him here.

Rennie nods his head low, hugging the tablet to his side. No fingers going away at the tablet, as he races out of the darkened room, since Rennie did not bother to turn on a light before entering. Pollux cries out lowly in his throat, some sort of rebuttal to make him stop, as _if._ Rennie hasn't spoken to him since the day of Interview Nights, where he presses his hands up against his throat, squeezing, choking, intentionally harming himself to end a potential relationship, because Pollux has reached into the darkest part of his soul and seized it.

"Rennie, wait!" Pollux calls out to him, setting his box down.

He doesn't turn, he keeps his head high. Behind him, there's the shuffling of feet, the clunking of something heavy onto the main table, and then the clopping of footsteps on carpet. The man is running after him... and Rennie wishes he had a weapon so he could turn around and shove it straight into the interviewer's throat.

"Rennie, please," the man tries again, this time a lot closer, voice a lot louder, bouncing off of the tight hallways, Rennie's chest feeling restricted and tight. "I need to talk with you," and Pollux reaches for Rennie's wrist, seizing it, and making the man turn around.

His eyes widen, anger burning in his corneas, about to slap Pollux for all it is worth, but Pollux isn't holding him by the wrist angrily, he realizes, the anger receding away back into the soles of his feet. The grip is tender, softer than he expects, like back then, the way back then, when their mouths were pressed together, and their hearts beating in unison as they splattered the windows with their making. A low growl rises up from Rennie's throat, but the interviewer will not let go.

"Listen, I just want to talk..." he drops the man's wrist, and there is a red indention from the initial hard seizure, Rennie rubbing the spot, and he pulls out his tablet, but stops for a second, raising an eyebrow.

He signs his statement at Pollux. " _What do you want?"_

Pollux takes a slight step back, there being the tilt of his upper lip in a small smirk, but nothing compared to what Rennie has seen before. "That's the Sign Language book Lewlyn gave you, isn't it?" he rubs the back of his neck. "I read the email, and I tried practicing some, so you wouldn't have to use the tablet that Bonnie gave you constantly..."

Rennie's heart skips twice for two things, one that it is Bonnie who gifts him with the tablet in the first place, a tool he's been using for so long he forgot who gave it to him initially in the beginning, and has he ever thanked her? Secondly, that Pollux even read the email, as he knows Bonnie hasn't, she didn't give it a second glance and ridiculed him for it... but here, this man who is more self-indulged than anyone he's ever met, learning it for him?

Another sign. " _Okay, now what do you want?_ "

The interviewer scratches the back of his neck. "I know that you and I are not on the best of terms..." his face flushes scarlet. "I- I wanted to make amends, like Lewlyn has to you," Rennie's never seen Pollux be this genuine, the years and years on the stage have twisted and warped his mind, causing the man to think he's always on showtime, always needing to be prim, proper, perfect, and be the guy Panem has wanted to see, but here in front of him, all undone in every lateral sense, Rennie feels a twinge of sympathy spike through him. "When we were together-" Rennie is incapable of holding the snort in. They were not _together,_ they had sex one time and Pollux got it all twisted. The man's eyebrows soften, and Pollux looks at the redhead with hints of tears flicking in his eyes. "I wanted to say I'm sorry, Rennie."

" _Why?"_

The man shakes his head, a lump forming in his throat. "I am not going to play this game with you where you force me to make a joke of myself in front of you. You know why I want to apologize."

He goes for the tablet this time, as he is unsure how to sign the next statement, and he's pretty sure that wanting the interviewer to eat crow and his own pride as he tells him the truth is something Pollux will not understand, for the learning of Panemian Sign Language - PSL as Lewlyn calls it, for short - is an arduous process, it'll take more than six days to master it. " _I want to hear you say it, Pollux. It's for the best._ " He types it out, and shows the man the tablet.

Pollux swallows the evident lump, eyes never leaving the Avox's face. "When we were together, and I said I wanted to kill your sister, I- I didn't mean it," and the hint of sadness appears again, causing his lips to downturn. "I always thought you were handsome, whenever we'd be around each other, but I felt... insecure about asking you out," the man's face is half ghost white and half cherry tomato red, as if he cannot decide to be frightened or embarrassed. "And then Lewlyn betrayed you like that, and you seemed utterly devoted to her," he shrugs his shoulders, eyes now fixated on a spot on Rennie's arm, but Rennie keeps his gaze directly at Pollux. "I felt jealous and wanted a piece of that. I thought your sister was a monster and I wanted to save you from her," a deep sigh. "And somehow I thought I was the one for the job."

" _You don't have to apologize about wanting to look out for me like that, Pollux,"_ he types out.

The interviewer lifts an arm up, placing his hand on his sternum, a sign of comfort, as Rennie has noticed all the ways people communicate when his own has been severely lacking. "Over the last few weeks, I've seen Lewlyn changing. She isn't some monster, but she isn't perfect, either, Rennie. I have to forgive her, and I have to forgive myself for the things I've done, because your sister isn't evil," a perceptible shake of his head. "Misguided, perhaps."

" _You don't know the first thing about my sister,_ " Rennie cannot help himself. He feels the need to stick up for her, they shared a mother and father who loved them both very much, and Rennie has seen first hand the tendrils that encapsulate her, hiding her auburn hair and cold unblemished skin from the world, how she's a piece of candy he could savor over and over again, when he's on his knees, looking at her unlace the back of her dress, it falling to the floor.

Pollux gives a slight smile. "Forever her champion, aren't you?" He shrugs his shoulders again. "Doesn't matter; she's trying to fix herself. She freed you, she gave you a new violin and-" Rennie's head snaps back at the interviewer. She gave him the new violin last night... how would he know about that? He doesn't go for the tablet, though, neither does he sign his next statement. Perhaps it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. "I'm sorry for even putting the notion in your head of me hurting her. That was wrong of me."

He signs this. " _It was._ "

The man purses his lips, shuffling his feet on the floor, his shoes making a squeaking noise as the rubber touches the laminated wood. "Rennie, I want to ask you something. It's important."

Returning to the tablet, Rennie fires away before the interviewer can even open his mouth. It is how it happens, every time, where he opens his mouth and poison comes out. " _I'm not going out with you._ "

"What- I-" Pollux starts, shaking his head. "No, that isn't what I was going to ask you," he grips the Avox's hands, their fingers an odd clash of hot and cold, fiery and freezing. "I wanted to ask if you love me."

Rennie's heart stops beating, it feels like that at the very least. His eyes match the interviewer's, and they're dead serious, the pupils emboldened, the irises colored darker than before. There is not a hint of humor in the question. He has to think about it all, about his sexuality. He isn't so sure he's attracted to men or women in the sense that Pollux only wants the affectionate company of men. He's always found Pollux Aetos, Mr. Extraordinaire to be extremely attractive, handsome, and definitely have a wondrous body if that night in his apartment is anything to go by, but he had never done it with another man before. He isn't against trying it again with someone who has a more clean heart not all covered up by the Capitol muck, but he's not against it.

He shakes his head in dissent. He does not love him, and he never will.

"Do you love Bonnie?" Pollux asks.

Rennie bites on his lower lip. The effervescent, wondrous viper with blonde hair and pale skin, a temptation he's tried before, a temptation he's wanted to try before but never has. How all her beauty cannot mask the blackness in her soul. He shakes his head again in dissent. He does not love her. He's tried before, Rennie has, and it failed miserably, but that may have been since she used to be the only one who treated him for who he is. A human, not a slave, not a traitor, not a lapdog of the Capitol, but a human with flesh, blood, nails, hair, eyes, a soul... and then her mask is peeled off, and all Rennie can smell is the stench of death.

Pollux looks down at the floor for a brief moment, and then back at Rennie. "Do you love Lewlyn?" The redhead reaches for the tablet, as he expects the question, but Pollux places a hand gently on Rennie's, lowering it back to his side. "Not in the brotherly and sisterly dynamic, Rennie. I'm asking if you love Lewlyn. Do you love your sister?"

The saddest part of it all, to Rennie, is that he isn't quite so sure. Even when they're kids, much younger and incapable of understanding the great designs at work, his heart is sometimes enraptured when a sunbeam causes Lewlyn's hair to vibrate like the coals in a hearth, or how her eyes light up as he grasps the end of a violin for the first time. Initially, when she used to force herself on him, as he's bound to the chair via tape, and her lips glide against his skin, he's repulsed. He's heard the horror stories of incest and children formed from those relationships, of all the defects they suffer from, but he and Lewlyn never get that far, he's pretty sure.

Over time, the walls are bared down, whittled to the grime and mortar they're composed of, and Rennie sees the same beauty in Lewlyn that he saw at thirteen that he does now at thirty-four, and when Lewlyn kisses him softly on the cheek - never on the lips, not any longer - he can still taste the cotton candy mingling in the back of his throat, or the scent of her perfume, lilac and a hint of copper, the way she can undo his spine and all of the pressure inside his stomach with the spreading of her fingers... Rennie exhales and sees stars dance on the ceiling.

Now that she's freed him, and that she's learning a whole new language for him, and how she bought him a newly painted violin... the tears Rennie sees in Lewlyn's eyes are more truthful than what he's ever known.

He nods his head, trying to mouth the words, which is impossible, but the effect is all the same.

" _I love her..._ "

Pollux nods his head, closing his eyes for a second. "That's what I was afraid of, Rennie," the interviewer exhales a shaky breath, his shoulders rising and falling. "I expected it, but I can't change your heart," and he swallows. "I think you should tell her how you feel, Rennie. See if there'd actually be anything there, you know?" Pollux digs into his pocket, pulling out a crumpled piece of paper, pushing it into his hand, fingers and palms touching briefly, ever so briefly. "Give this to her in the meantime, Rennie," another closing of his eyes. "I'll see you around."

The Master of Ceremonies makes his way down the hallway, Rennie following him with his eyes, before opening his hand.

It is a simple sheet of paper rolled up into a ball, with the blue lines starting to smear, the white page blending in with the paint on the walls. He waits until Pollux's body disappears behind a doorway, back out into the Capitol air, and then he unfurls the sheet, which is crumbled, sort of hard to read. Unfolding it all the way, there's a sentence written in the middle of the paper, crudely put together in what looks like pencil, it very faint to his eyes.

Rennie's blood turns to ice.

 _Whose idea was it to end the Hunger Games? I want in._

He drops the sheet of paper like it is radioactive, it falling onto the wooden floor, and Rennie's heart begins to beat in his chest erratically.

Rennie looks back down the hallway from where Pollux entered and left, the hall not seeming welcoming any longer.

The- the secret is out?

Lewlyn- oh god, Lewlyn!

He leaves the paper behind, Rennie racing from the hallway, away from Bonnie's dark and cramped office that is depressing just to look at, and the Avox runs for his sister as if his life depends on it.

Pollux Aetos, damned him, is absolutely right.

He'll forever be her champion.

* * *

 ** _Hector Merviere: Victor of the 77th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

He inhales the summer air with a luxurious sigh, feeling the District 10 warmth spread down his back. Hector is standing outside of his Victors Village home, his brother's dormant on the other side of the street, a sleeping giant that is usually never awoken, as Arizona is usually never home. One other home is occupied in the district, from the way back times before the Nightlock berries, but the woman is a recluse, who never comes out unless it is Reaping time. Hector is always over there, however, for company, since his home is way too large for a single person to be living in it.

Out in front of him, Hector watches two little kids and a woman play around in the grass, their bright Sunday clothes rubbed darkly with the stains of the Earth. The same hill and lake he and his brother see Hero and Victoria from, the two hopefuls, two that could have won it all, and instead... instead, _they're dead,_ and so is he. Hector clears his throat, shifting his elbows, which are resting on the terrace edge, he standing on the terrace overlooking the lake. Technically the kids and their mother are trespassing, since the hillside is Capitol property, but for family, he'll let it slide.

"Watch yourself out there!" he shouts at them, grinning, raising his glass of water up to his lips, taking a swig. The Games are almost over, but true to his word, he's home, he's back home and he won't return to the Capitol until Bonnie gives birth, and he may not be back even then.

He watches his brother's children, and their 'mother' frolic in the daises, their matching waves of dark hair sticking out like sore thumbs in the bright waves of the flowers. Elias and Arianne, those are the names Hale and Arizona settle for when naming their son and daughter, who are only a year apart, and are thick as thieves, with their curly hair, tanned faces, and Elias is starting to show the same signs of durability as his father did at that age, spry and youthful, charming at seven and eight years old. The woman with them is a random District 10 girl given the opportunity for greatness, with remarkable likeliness to Hale, just enough for no one to cast second glances, but she doesn't love her brother the way the Hunger Games victor does, and because of that, he cannot extend the same kindness.

His niece and nephew just might be his whole world, truthfully, as he watches Elias tumble into Arianne, the two wrestling in the dirt, she getting her dress all scuffed up, as Hailey watches on, cheering and clapping, but there's a sinister feel over the lake, as the sunshine falls down. Hector can feel it resting over his skin, that there is someone somewhere watching this on a videotape, making record of what the see, but he can chalk it all up to paranoia truthfully. The water reflects off of a sunray, shimmering like liquid sapphire, a swim seeming high on the list for what Hector might need.

He hasn't married, nor has he dated anyone significant lately in his life, so the massive house is all his, when sometimes Arizona and the rest of the family, which has had Hale in it once or twice, visit for presents on Christmas, or to share warm stories of kinship around the fire, their skin alit with the glowing coals of flame. How Hailey's laugh is slightly off kilter when she tosses her head back at a joke Arizona says, when she hits him playfully on the arm, but it is Hale who kisses his brother after they talk, and how Elias and Arianne are too young to understand... neither of them know what is at stake. Neither know what to believe, because to them, _Hailey_ is mommy, and Hale... well, she's simply Hale Cornerstone, a dear and good friend of their father's and uncle's.

Hector steps off of the terrace and back to his house, leaving his niece and nephew to play around with the woman who truly doesn't love either child, she has to be all in it for the fame and notoriety. Off to his left is his office, which has him sometimes sleeping in the spinning chair on more than one occasion. There's a landline phone, wired by some genius from District 3 at the time, to the Capitol in case anyone needs to call.

The victor hesitates, as changing for a jump in the lake is tempting, but he doesn't have the Games on and should a Peacekeeper come by to do a checking-in that the victors of Panem are following the rules, Hector does not need a citation or a billy club to the back of the head.

He steps into his office, stone changing to tile, his bare feet lifting lightly at the cold and sensuous feel. Hector takes another sip of water when the phone on the desk vibrates of the chain, causing him to stop in mid-drink. Hector holds his water glass in one hand, picking up the phone in the other. Sometimes there's a wayward call, since his number looks remarkably close to Pollux Aetos's, the Master of Ceremonies, a digit off, he believes where a six is turned upside down into a nine and people who cannot read or are just plain stupid dial by mistake. At least twice a day he has to do this, so it must be another wayward caller.

"Hello," he greets, as he picks up the phone. "This is Hector Merviere speaking."

"Hector!" comes a woman's voice on the other end, and his blood cools, as if he inhaled the entire glass of water all at once. It's Lewlyn, her voice panicked on the other end, and he can hear how hard she's breathing. "Hector, are you there?"

"Lewlyn?" he exclaims, frowning, voice echoing around the empty house. "What's- what's wrong?"

"Someone found out!" the Head Gamemaker cries, and her breathing elevates even higher, at a faster speed than before. "The secrets are out, Hector! Someone else knows!"

"Knows what?" he demands at her. "Which secrets?"

"All of them!" Lewlyn yells back at him.

The glass of water goes tumbling out of Hector's hand, shattering onto the floor, and the phone falls with it. The Head Gamemaker continues to speak on the phone, something about Pollux, and Rennie, and a piece of paper or other, but he doesn't care, that isn't what it is important to him right now. Hector runs back out onto the terrace, eyes seizing up Elias and Arianne, laughing together, splashing each other in the water, heart pounding in his chest.

Who- how- what...? His mind cannot think straight. His heart roars in his ears.

Someone knows. What, exactly? According to Lewlyn, all of them.

They all built a massive house of cards, and someone's knocked them down.

Question is, who?

Who threw the first punch?

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, there we are, Chapter #45: Their House of Cards. And oh Jeezum Crow, I really did not mean for the chapter to get a 9k word count for an OC Capitol-chapter lol, but what do I know. We have the plot advancing yet again, ladies and gents, and everything is coming to a close in just five chapters. Calhoun and Bonnie forge another lank in their ladder that is their ever collapsing and rebuilding relationship, Lance has called Kevia out on her bullshit for the last time, Rennie has admitted he loves Lewlyn, and unless Hector is misinterpreting what our Head Gamemaker is saying, the secrets are out. _All of them._**

 **Next chapter, #46: Victories in the Fire, will actually be less than 9k lol, I am aiming for 4k-6k for the final arena chapter, where it'll be down between Valencia and Peri for the crown, vying for victor of the 100th Hunger Games, of the 4th Quarter Quell. Predict right now, if you think you can guess, who is winning... because I am sure we're at half and half here. After that, Chapters 47-50, which I hope you all stay around for, will be dedicated to our new victoress, and the ending of the Capitol arc, which is going to be explosive and amazing and I cannot wait for it, ya'll have no idea.**

 **Please review, it'd mean a whole lot to me for your opinions, commentary, and whatnot! I am so excited guys, that I am really pushing, pushing as hard as I can since it is only two points of view for the closing arena chapter, to have it out no later than Tuesday, the 13th, but I am aiming for either tomorrow or Monday, so keep your eyes peeled, and check those inboxes! Thank you all so much for reading, I love you all so much! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	46. Victories in the Fire (Day 10-Finale)

**Hey ladies and gentlemen, this is Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #46: Victories in the Fire. This is it guys, all you readers and submitters and whatnot, this is the final moment in the arena you have been waiting for, Valencia from District 1 versus Peri from District 7, both with their own problems - Valencia suffering from a lack of confidence and a broken sword hand, and Peri who is sickened with cancer, but boosted by a strength serum given to her via President Calhoun. We are down to the final two, originally at 24, twenty-three chapters ago (can you believe that?) and we've gone through, in order: Linden, Milor, Carrion, Colt, Caiden, Annabellina, Persephone, Alexandra, Marcus, Hero, Maisey, Rochelle, Edwin, Corvus, Marissa, Victoria, Blake, Marina, Galiant, Gaia, Lowelle, and Deacon... and we've ended with Valencia and Peri. Who will reach runner-up status, and who will become our victor of the 100th Quarter Quell?**

 **I've got another song request for ya'll to listen to as you read. When the action begins - you'll know what it is when it happens, which will be in the 2nd POV - play the song 'The Night King' from the Game of Thrones Season 8 soundtrack; the piece is about nine minutes, which I hope the action takes that long to read, as the song fits perfectly for it, and my past two suggestions I think have really worked. Start the moment our second Point of View hears something behind her, when she is crouched down in front of a pool... I think everything will go perfectly from there. Hope you all enjoy Chapter #46: Victories in the Fire.**

* * *

 ** _Peri Florence: District 7 Female P.O.V (16)_**

* * *

 _She's stuck in a field of lilacs, she lying down and crushing the flowers underneath her. Peri yawns, stretching her arms out to be hit by the full power of the sun above her, it a ferocious ball of crimson, droplets of corona dripping to the ground, sizzling whatever flowers it touches. The scene is not scenic, but to Peri, she's immersed in a world of relaxation as the field burns around her, she plucking flowers out of the ground, rolling the stems in her fingers, smoothly wrenching one free before crushing it under her palm. A scent of sulfur rides the air, the sky a luminous copper color, brimming with electricity that cackles over her skin._

 _The lilacs smell as well, but not of their ordinary scent, but of rubber, tar-like, and Peri frowns, holding another up to her face, it focusing in her vision while the background dissipates. She wonders what it tastes like, throwing it into her mouth. The girl chews it for a bit, before spitting it back out into the green colored sand, the flower wadded up in one massive agglomeration, like taffy. Her tongue has residues of the stem left in the center, the backwash taste almost minty, but more sour than that, and she starts thinking of turmeric and spices that she's never heard of before._

 _A gust of wind blows through the field, a freezing cold gale, but she is unfazed, sitting stock still and ripping lilacs out of their bed root. She's too used to people from her past ripping her up and chewing her inside their own cavernous mouths before spitting her out. Peri Florence is over it, and it is time people stop extending her so much pity on a silver platter. Peri is certain to herself that with her condition, with the cancer that plagues her body and makes it hard to breathe, that it has exposed her inability to enact pity on someone else. The dagger in her hand, coated with blood, it discarded a few feet from her in the lilacs, are enough to tell her that. How she inserts it into someone's skin, the way it breaks and floods, and wide eyes search for her own, desperate for comfort, and all Peri does is break their fingers that grasp for her._

 _Peri shifts her body so she's sitting with her legs crossed, more of the incendiary flame from above falling to the ground, evaporating the flora. She inhales the fumes, exhaling a combustible form of carbon dioxide out. Off in the distance, she can a shadowed figure of a form walking to her, but she doesn't move from her position. The figure is rather small, and she has the dirt and lilacs to defend her, where the dirt is warm underneath her fingers, and if she removes a clump by digging, a steaming stream of hot gas pours out into the copper sky... she has her defense system all lined up._

 _The figure gets closer, and Peri's eyes go alit with fire. "Linden..." she exhales sweetly, and her district partner steps out into the mesh. His hair is all undone, strands sticking out this way and that, his eyes warm and familiar, hands outstretched to greet her, he dressed in a plain white uniform of some kind, almost blending together in a state like a halo. He reaches her, the two colliding in a hug as she gets to her feet, and she breathes in the hickory and the maple syrup, the pine and the acorns, the chittering of squirrels in their nest... and the strength of his touch, as waves roll underneath the shirt when he moves._

 _"Linden..." Peri repeats, looking into his eyes._

 _He follows suit, smiling sweetly, bringing a hand to her face. His touch is warm too, like the entire environment around her, but nothing more uncomfortable than the ground she digs her hands into. His fingers slide down her cheek, Peri shuddering to the close contact. She is about to mouth his name again, as his own is moving, trying to say something, when she notices the faint, but definitely there, red ring that circles his neck, where there are two black indention marks at his pulse, where thumbs would be, and as she says something, his touch becomes icy cold._

 _Her district partner, the man she thought she might have loved, grabs her by the face, and twists, bones crunching, Peri never even able to cry out._

...

...

"Linden!" Peri awakes with a start, screaming his name, flinging herself off of the tree she's resting in. The girl rolls off of the high branch she finds herself crooked in, collapsing onto the concrete below. She groans as her body hits the pavement rather strongly, feeling the vibration send a shockwave up through her arm. It takes Peri a moment to lift her head, groaning under the duress, trying to get to her knees.

She can still hear the sound of her neck breaking, the bones falling with it, the thump of her body touching the ground, and his sneer that follows suit, a sneer with eyes that are not eyes, but black pits bearing into her soul. Peri does not deserve this, she is no villain; she's just a desperate girl suffering from a carnivorous disease eating her alive from the inside wanting to get home to become rich and famous and rip the cancer out of her root and stem, all of them being incinerated away in the fire.

Her cheeks are still damp with tears from the crying before, and there is a slight crustiness on her left cheek from Linden's blood, she unable to wash it out as she hovers over a tiny pond in the arena, scrubbing, scrubbing, _scrubbing,_ but nothing disappears. The sickness is still there, hitting the back of her throat, like the mint and rubber lilac leaf. She grinds her teeth last night, shivering, as Linden isn't there for her to crawl up to and share body heat.

Peri presses a hand to her side, wincing at the pressure. This is odd, she thinks to herself, biting down on her lip, but she doesn't say anything out loud. It is not as if anyone will hear her, truthfully. It's just her and one other tribute left, that Career from District 1. " _Valencia Shale..._ " she echoes inside her mind, the name vibrating off of the cranial walls. Almost sounds foreign, as if she hasn't spoken to herself in her head in eons, where spiders crawl around on cobwebs, pockets of light showing abandoned stations for thought.

Just two days ago, when she admits to Linden about her parents being pathetic and how they should not have slept together, as Carrion's picture shines in the sky - _That marks the end of my days,_ she laments to herself - she and Linden try climbing the oak tree after the anthem is announced, with her head lowered with a heavy heart in sign of passing for the others, to see the entire arena for themselves from the vantage point, Peri is unable to make the full climb like limber and able Linden, she trying to snag onto a branch that she cannot reach, and so she leaps, she misses, and she _falls._ Peri expects pain to meet her, despite landing on the soft grassy hill side, which has been nothing but comfort, but when she lands two nights ago, there is nothing there. No bruise. No blemish, and seldom any pain.

Now? Peri grits her teeth, warning signs flashing at the edges of her vision. Moving away the tribute uniform, heavily sticky with sweat and blood and tears and rainwater, Peri sees a bruise starting to form, the grim black and blue outputs, and a lump forms in her throat. Calhoun never- the president never! Panic begins to race through her mind. Calhoun never mentioned to her, as far as she can recall, of this strength serum running out of serum. However, as she looks at the forming wound, which forms from a fall that is a third of the size as the one from two days ago, the worry is there.

She squints, shifting over to the left some, and sees something catch her eye in the glinting sunlight. Peri kneels down in front of it, grabbing it and bringing it to her eyes. Hair. A solid clump of hair. Peri gasps, reaching above her head, and sure enough, where she can vividly remember there being a patch of hair right on the center of her scalp... it's missing. Is this it crushed in her hands? The hair she is staring at is long and blonde, and a second lump seems to join the first. It starts low, in the clump, like the initial hearth color she's used to, as the strength serum rapidly began growing her hair back to normal, but changed its color, where usually Peri Florence is a vivid blonde, her mother describing her hair to be liquidous sunlight, in which she snorts at the extreme pretentiousness of the simile. " _It's just blonde hair,"_ she criticizes them over dinner at one point, her parents swallowing their plates whole in guilt and shame, " _Just call it that, and don't look so uppity to everyone else. We're just as poor as the rest of Seven._ "

Her heart begins to accelerate its beat a bit faster as she notices the changing hues, unmistakable from glowing coals to the liquidous sunlight - Peri smiles to herself at the simile; it certainly is a ridiculous comparison to use - and she stumbles back away from the clump in shock. What would Linden say? He'd be on the spot to her side, to her defense, when he never needed to be, always there to champion a reassuring thought, rubbing soothing circles into her shoulder blades, where she'd breathe and a column of flame would expel from her throat as the faded flower is revitalized.

She misses him.

" _You miss him, because you killed him,"_ some voice from far, far away hisses at her, mockingly.

" _Shut up,_ " she tells it. " _You don't know how I am feeling_."

It had to happen, she reassures herself, but she cannot find any comfort for it in the bowels of worry about the bruise, and the hair. Come to think of it, Peri realizes, as she gets to her feet, she's no longer feeling as nimble, as brisk. However, her mind solely focuses itself on Linden and the inevitability of his demise. The final three, it is them two and Valencia now, as Milor falls to his death, head bashed in with a rock. She thinks of it rather spontaneously, as his eyes widen and there is blood on his hands, he nearly having died, _she nearly having died._ It has always sat in the back of her mind, the moment Calhoun watches her throw the ball at the wall with that unmistakable might, that there... there's a honest chance of her winning here, of returning to her loving family. It could happen.

Originally, as she tells him on their bed they shared for all of training, he is to leave her in the dust when she falls, and try to win.

"Now it's my turn..." Peri whispers to herself.

Valencia would have made mincemeat of him, she thinks to herself. Linden would not have been able to handle it. Had they come down to it, to the two of them, it'd probably occur to him last that it is either her or him. She would've killed him then, but Peri knows inside her heart she wouldn't have been able to bear it then and there, had they been the final two, to destroy him in that manner. District 7 would never forgive him? Can they forgive her now?

"Perhaps if I bring home a victory," she rationalizes, chewing on the inside of her lower lip.

Peri gets to her feet, a bit slower than yesterday, slower than the day before that, but she tries not to think about it. Her axe is resting up against the tree, and she entertains the idea of leaving the gladius behind in Linden's corpse, but decides against it last minute. Perhaps a blade through the Achilles tendon? She's not quite sure what beast has taken ahold of her and her thoughts, but if it secures her victory, she's game.

She hears the sponsor gift before she sees it, Peri lifting her head up as her fingers barely glance around the hilt of the axe, rubber and heavy in her hand. The parachute lands behind her with a clunk on the concrete, she turning around, brandishing the gladius at the gift. It doesn't explode, like she expects, and races over to it. The parachute is attached to a heavy box, foam-like substance, and she rips the lip off, digging inside.

A noise of surprise catches in her throat, one of pleasure and admiration, as she pulls out a brand new weapon. A brand new axe. Peri's eyes widen, and the elixir of life flows through her vein. Sex with Linden might've been wonderful, but this just might be the best thing she's ever seen. The hilt is stone, alternating waves of auburn red and oak brown, signature District 7 colors, lined up to a shining silver blade, freshly sharpened, as she can smell the sparks that fire off of the creation of the weapon, a smelter's calling card trick.

Attached to the axe blade, Peri notices there's a strange sort of wrap inside, and a glove colored the same exact pattern as the wrap. She picks it up, placing the extra sheet at the bottom of the axe, which would face her if she were to throw it. An odd computer-like noise comes from the pad, and the glove in her hand vibrates, a suave dark leather, matching abyss black with turquoise, digital lines moving down the glove. She puts the glove on, which makes a likewise digital gurgling noise, and then the pad and her glove vibrate.

Peri stands side face from the book, at the tree she had slept on, a high branch so she can stare at the fireflies under the guise of night. She throws the axe with all of her might, leaving her a bit breathless. The axe soars sideways, not at all in the way she threw it, colliding into the tree trunk, but it doesn't make a sound. Under normal circumstances, Peri is pretty sure, she'd have to go and get the axe, try and not be killed on the way there, right? She outstretches her hand, prepared to walk back over, when the axe rips free of its mark, a wide and deep gash into the trunk, and it collides back onto her glove, it connecting to the pad she wraps around the base.

She squeals in glee. "An axe that operates like... like a boomerang!" Peri exclaims.

There- there must be a note, right?

The girl from Seven drops back into the box, and attached to one end of the parachute string is a manila card. She rips it free, bringing it to her eyes.

 _You're almost there, kid. A shame about Linden, I know, but had it been you and him in the final two, one of you would've done it then anyways... no Katniss or Peeta situation happening here, the Capitol is too smart for that. So, in the guise of that, there are a whole lot of people who want to see you come home over the Career, make their losing streak go on a bit longer. They managed to scrap a whole ton of money for this device, a plaything by some inventor or other for Peacekeeper weapons... and this thing came to be._

Peri frowns, furrowing her eyebrows, at the next line which reads,

 _Don't continue reading past this line until you hit the button just above where you'd place the zoning pad. It's black, press it once, and then press it again immediately after, and resume reading._

No harm in trying, she supposes, and Peri lowers the card onto her knee, balancing on one rather doggedly, the axe weighing her down slightly. It doesn't look heavy, but it feels heavy to her. There is indeed a black button, sticking out just an inch or two above what her mentor considers the zoning pad, and she presses it, and the second rush of euphoria floods her veins.

The blade, shining silver in the sun, smelling of cinders and ironworks, _ignites._ The blade turns to fire, voracious, stunning, the flames reflecting in her eyes, she hypnotized by the dancing effect, but she hits the button off again, and the flames extinguish in milliseconds, as if they didn't exist. Peri is unable to catch her breath, due to the excitement of it all.

A sponsor gift, a sponsor weapon axe that returns to her, and can ignite...

She cackles to herself gleefully. How can Valencia Shale stand a chance to this?

Peri resumes the reading of the card. There isn't much left.

 _Set the world on fire, Peri. Set ablaze the entire arena and ruin the Capitol's good work. Win the Games like the fighter I know you are._

 _~ Forever, the man watching your six._

She flicks the card back into the box, smiling wickedly to herself. Oh... oh _indeed,_ the challenge is quite tempting.

"Set the world ablaze..." she tells herself, getting to her feet. "Set the world on fire!" she chants.

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: District 1 Female P.O.V (17)_**

* * *

Her sword hand is broken. It is crushed underneath one of the falling stones as she tries to grab her backpack from falling forever down into the collapsed shaft. Her scream of pain, the splashing of scarlet... it is all there, and the Capitol sees it all. When she finally manages to wrench her arm free, a croak escapes her throat, perhaps the most pitiful noise Valencia has ever heard herself utter in her life, not very well versed in the experiences of pain. Her fingers are mangled, but not bent out of the shape, simply all forced together, but she cannot lift them or hold anything in them. It is just her hand, luckily, she rationalizes to herself, her nerves shot, her senses heightened to a fifteen, all buzzing with static in her ears.

She collapses from exhaustion a few hours later, scrambling towards the unknown zone of the arena, desperate to reach it. She is not going out without finding what it is in the grayed spot on the map. Valencia snaps awake to the sound of a cannon, shortly followed by another, and she knows, deep down, it is her versus someone from District 7, someone that didn't make it between the pair, which means Milor died. How, she's not sure. A sponsor gift falls from the sky, Valencia crying out in joy, as it is Kevia and Lance's combined efforts late in the evening that send her a cast to stick her hand in, the immobility causing some of the spasming pain to cease, and a canteen filled with water, as well as a bowl of soup and an apple. Attached to it is a sponsor card, signed by Lance and not Kevia, which puzzles her, but she's not going to think too deep about it.

 _Try and stay alive. We're all betting on you._

 _~ Lance Viel_

Valencia closes her eyes in exultation, praising something somewhere in the sky, but she doesn't direct her prayer to any one individual. She dozes off for a bit, snapping awake as the anthem roars in her ears. Her heart falls when Milor's face shines in the sky first. They had their differences in the end, she knows, but he's unable to fulfill her promise of keeping Carrion safe, of watching out for his boyfriend... the rage must've consumed him when the time came to fight, to prove his worth. Linden's face follows after, and her mind searches a thousand different options.

A. Milor kills Linden - first cannon heard - and Peri kills Milor - second cannon heard.

B. Linden kills Milor - first cannon heard - and Peri kills Linden - second cannon heard.

C. Someone kills someone - first cannon heard - and the Capitol intervenes in someway - second cannon heard.

She cannot believe that somehow, against all odds, there is a District that manages to be the last one with both tributes alive that isn't the Careers. Despite there not being a Career victory for awhile, Valencia is positively sure that it is either One, Two, or Four with both the male and female tributes still breathing by the time the final five or four roll around... but it is District 7, and she realizes immediately that she has to fight Peri to go home, to make it back to her family, her friends... to _survive._

Peri Florence is an enemy all unknown to Valencia, and that bothers her, stirring something deep in her chest. She's never fought someone she doesn't know anything about. The strength aspect is easy, as Marcus mentions that night after the Cornucopia bloodbath, that the girl, who seemed to be suffering an ailment, must not have it, as there is strength tenfold in Peri's body when they fight, but zero training. Zero precision. Simply swings... Valencia can beat a simple swing. She's trained. Weaknesses? Real weaknesses... Valencia cannot come up with any.

It hits her then, as she takes another sip of water from the massive canteen, stomach growling due to having finished the soup ages ago, that there's just her and Peri left. Twenty-four tributes reduced comically down to two. Two. She stumbles for a second, leaning up against a tree to support herself from the emotional weight. Twenty-two young lives ripped away from Panem, who might have had futures ahead of them. Marcus, gone to betrayal. Hero, gone to idealism. Annabellina in self-sacrifice. Her Persephone, burnt away and blown like ashes spewing from a volcano. Milor, reduced to rubble in an emotional state that she sees. Futures stolen away from her.

"Perhaps if I was somewhere else, another timeline..." Valencia grumbles to herself, closing the canteen, "I could have had a future with Persephone..." she is incapable of getting the girl out of her head, it now six days since she sees her ally collapse to the ground, a smoldering mess, burning, screaming, _dying._ The way her fingers touched her skin, softly kissing her cheek, lulling her to sleep... Valencia shudders at the thought. "All gone," she whispers.

After waking up from the anthem, Valencia sets out again to the unmarked zone, and collapses again in an unceremonious heap when she reaches it, a cry escaping her throat. A sense of escapism.

Valencia has no idea how to describe it except a palm tree oasis of sorts, a massive courtyard of acai palm trees and alexander palm trees all rooted together in planters, halcyon lights swinging from side to side that connect on groups of three between each tree. Their trunks are removed of the branches that pierce and slice and kill, Valencia milling around each one of them, running her fingers up the bark.

There's a pool of clear liquid she fills her canteen with, a rather long pool extending out a good six to seven hundred feet, if Valencia can count. The pool leads to a rather ominous building, but Valencia does not dare venture into it, as she looks down at her hand. She knows how to swim, Valencia reassures herself, staring at the water, seeing zero movement inside. It is capital space for the Capitol to land a mutt, some poisonous water snake, or a crocodile, or Lucifer himself for all she knows inside.

Riding the air, Valencia can taste salt, a salty sea breeze, but she's never seen the ocean, she licking her lips, cracks forming in the skin. An oasis, that is the final world she encounters in this amusement park arena, where she cannot see any rollercoasters or any kind of attraction in sight, unless there's something in the steel building that rises high over the oasis. In one corner, Valencia can pick up on the sound of trickling water, and hiding behind some of the palm trees, there's a running waterfall. It is in the middle of the night, nearing three or four in the morning at this point, and she undresses herself, stepping into the water.

The rocks are sheen, glossy and slippery, and she does not try to climb them. Valencia looks at her reflection in the water, at her breasts which were nowhere near the size of Persephone or Maisey's, and Maisey loved to let her know where she fell short. How her hair is not stylized in the way Annabellina's had been, decorative and gorgeous, glittering like clinking quarters on the sidewalk. Her muscles are defined in the water, but there is no bulk, unlike what Milor and Carrion possess as they swing their spears and their swords.

Valencia is relieved as all hell when she realizes she still has her sword. The sleeping bag and backpack are gone, however, the sleeping bag lost as it weighs her down as she runs, and the backpack to the terrors of the arena. She doesn't know what to do, she comes to terms with herself, if she had lost her weapon, the one violent instrument in the entire world that'd ruin her life if she lost. Valencia bites on her tongue, nearly ripping it off from the pressure, as she sits underneath the crashing water, at how much she hates the Hunger Games.

Back at the Academy, home in One, she doesn't make friends or gain sympathies for other fighters, all competition for her. As Kevia coaches her on what being a victor means, the gilded gaze glosses over her body, and Valencia wants in on that life, and only that life, that's it. Now, though, as she clenches her chest, feeling her heart beat beneath her skin, her eyes are exposed to a beautiful hill, blooming with flowers, teeming with wildlife... that is where Valencia goes in her sleep. Everyone she knows is alive, cloaked in white, laughing with one another, on a sandy beach, kicking up dirt and rolling around as they collide with the waves. They don't notice her. They do not hear her shouts for attention. No one comes over to her when Valencia collapses on the beach shore sobbing her eyes out, hugging herself for someone's warmth. Milor's. Persephone's. Her own.

She has created lasting and meaningful relationships with these strangers she's never met, all vying for some stupid crown and glory, to survive, and become rich. She's made it this far, and she wants to survive, that means one last kill. As water droplets splash off of the center of her fingers, off of the pad in the center, Valencia comes to a sudden realization she's only made one kill, and the fact she has to even say that to herself shocks her. Poor Galiant, an interview that has Hero crying to himself in his seat, Milor looking away with a locked jaw, and Valencia's heart beating in her chest... and then she ends his life not even twelve hours later, kicking him onto a spike that impales him through the chest, all because he's trying to kill her as she climbs that building for a sword.

Valencia, on the next morning, as the sun lapels at her skin, kneels in front of the pool, ten feet wide, and that long distance across that she measures after she dries off by walking foot in front of the other, counting out eight hundred and twelve feet to be exact, an odd number that she'll ask Lewlyn Davis about if she makes it back.

"If..." she repeats to herself, aloud, now in the present, hand dipping into the water, milling around. "If..." her voice trailing off.

She clenches her sword in her right hand. A good Career - Kevia's words, not hers - is trained rather adeptly with both hands on a dual-wield weapon. Archery or weapons you throw is a different story, but for physical, melee combat, you must be trained in both hands. Valencia is confident in her sword fighting skills with her left hand, the dominant... not her right. She's not a wilting flower, nor some helpless child with her sword hand decommissioned, but she's no lethal fighter either... she has to be realistic.

Valencia dips her hand in again, swirling the water around, noticing how shining her eyes are in the water, when her entire body tenses.

What- what's that _noise?_

She ducks, as just behind her, Valencia can see something sail above her head in the reflection of the pool water. Something soars above her, colliding into one of the palm tree she's kneeling next to. The Career looks up at the weapon, her mouth drying up. An... an _axe blade. Peri._ She grabs her sword, about to turn around and get to her feet, when the axe blade wrenches free of the palm tree it hits, flying back behind her. She has seconds to turn when the girl from Seven falls down upon her, swinging the axe blade down. Did Valencia forget to mention, to tell herself that the weapon is _on fire?_

Valencia yelps, rolling out of the way as Peri slashes down with her axe blade, surprisingly nimble. Valencia is just surprised she didn't hear the girl coming upon her, as she had to have been running. The sword feels awkward in her right hand, but it'll have to do. Peri throws the axe blade again, the gleaming edge a stunning cardinal and sunburst orange in the sunlight. Valencia ducks again as it collides into a palm tree, igniting it into flames. Valencia ducks her head in low, charging at the girl, as Peri wrenches her hand back for the axe to return to her grasp.

The Career feels the heat barely glance over the top of her head before she slams into Peri, the blade extinguishing the flame in a matter of milliseconds, as if it hadn't been there. Valencia raises her sword to swing down and slice Peri's neck, the two weapons colliding, as Peri holds her axe sideways, both girls grunting in pain. She has training, this axe maniac doesn't, Valencia has to remind herself over and over again. The two go back and forth, Valencia digging her heels into the ground, trying to push the sharp edge towards Peri's clavicle, but nothing is happening, the two at a stalemate.

Her feet slip on the stone, heat crawling at her back, Peri getting momentum and vaulting Valencia off. She skids a few feet, almost colliding into the flaming tree. A branch at the very top, which glittered emerald in the moonlight, collapses to the ground, nearly hitting her, and Valencia gasps, skirting over. Peri is back onto her feet, and she throws the axe again, Valencia sidestepping out of the way, hugging another palm tree to the side, the lights swinging back and forth, two trees now on fire. Her mouth goes dry again as the axe rips free, and the blade ignites once more. How... how is the axe blade not _melting? Will her sword melt?_

Peri steps closer in her direction, and Valencia goes right now, around the base, yelling out a battle cry. She swings again, and Peri ducks by lowering her back, the blade barely flying over her face. The girl from Seven backhands Valencia in the head, sending her forward some, onto the concrete. She manages to roll over onto her back just in time as Peri swings at her again, aiming for the Career's knee. Valencia tucks her body in, getting to her feet, sword in hand, but entirely off balance. Valencia yells at the girl from Seven, swinging low, yet wide, in a silver arc.

The axe-wielder leaps back a bit, coming at Valencia from the right, but her training picks up on it, as Peri shifts her feet in the direction she leaps, Valencia parrying the strike. Their weapons collide, as more of the palm trees begin to fall apart, the flames spiraling up the branches, torching the wires that hold the lamps up. They begin to short circuit, bursting into pocketed explosions of flame, glass bits flying everywhere. Peri strikes again, Valencia grabbing onto the hilt, her fingers nearly getting chopped off. Peri's eyes widen in surprise as Valencia grins to herself, letting go and stabbing forward with her blade.

It slices into Peri's leg, the girl crying out in pain, but the cut is shallow, and Valencia has to dance away before she can slice again. The two stand distant from one another, and Peri ignites her axe blade again, slamming it over and over into a palm tree that separates the two of them. The Career gasps again as the towering tree crumbles underneath the destroyed trunk, it falling and dividing the two girls from each other, she having to cover her eyes and turn away as it slams into the stone concrete, splashing into the wave pool, flames roaring into the air.

She screams, ducking again, as flames dance along the wires above, a lamp shattering, glass flying everywhere, and she can feel shards hit her, nothing dangerous, but enough if she's hit in the eyes. When Valencia opens them again, Peri is gone, vanished elsewhere, until she hears, faint on the wind, it soar towards her again. Valencia begins to run, but the axe blade hits the wall in front of her. She skids to a stop, waiting for the axe to return back to Peri, which it does, before she races off in the direction of the steel building, the building she knew she wouldn't go into, but she _must._

Peri races alongside her, throwing the axe into a palm tree, blade on fire, which causes Valencia to stop again, as when the blade flies back to her grasp, the scorching tree falls in front of her. Valencia looks at Peri, who looks at her, preparing to throw. The Career's eyes widen, she racing towards the pool, diving into it. A perceptible whistle of air of the axe soaring above her as she dives out of the way sings above her, cutting the wind, and Valencia swims underneath the palm tree that falls into the pool, the flames extinguished by the water.

The water is murky, cloudy, and Valencia struggles to hold her breath. She's one of the best swimmers in the Academy, Lance has taken great pride in telling everyone that, the praise embarrassing her. Something splashes behind her, and when Valencia resurfaces, still holding onto her sword, Peri collides into her again. Valencia gasps for breath underwater, it not being a deep pool, about four feet. Above her, standing in the water, hands seized around her throat, is Peri, the girl's eyes burning with hatred, burning with black retribution as the oasis above scalds to pieces. A trail of blood follows behind the girl's injured leg, but Valencia cannot notice that, as she flails around underneath Peri's grip, black dots burying into her vision.

She kicks out, luckily catching Peri straight in the knee, hoping it is hard enough to break it, as the girl releases her hold on her throat, Peri crying out, leaping back, hitting the burning log. Valencia comes back up, hacking water out of her lungs, the dark spots dissipating as she blinks. The girl from Seven, who did not jump into the pool with her axe it seems, searches for it wildly, both of their eyes locking onto it. Peri scrambles for it, the weapon sitting on the edge next to the pool, more lights popping out, bursting in halcyon dazes, Valencia leaping after her for it.

The girl from Seven barely manages to grapple onto it, Valencia seizing her ankle, pulling with all of her might, groaning. Peri yelps in terror as she is unable to bring the axe with her. Valencia, holding onto Peri, throws her against the palm tree now laying in the pool, catching the girl out of breath. Her sword floats beside her in the water, and she grabs it, stabbing again with another motion. Peri shrieks, rolling away from the weapon, which scuffs up against the trunk. Valencia aims again, this time swinging. Peri moves out of the way, eyes glowing, seeing Valencia's hand wrapped up in the cast.

As Valencia goes to swing again, Peri grabs her by the broken hand, squeezing. Valencia screams in pain, thrashing about, still holding the sword. Peri squeezes, squeezes, and _squeezes,_ the black dots returning to the corners of her vision, highlighted in brutal agony. This is the most pain she's ever felt in _her_ life, nothing else compares, not even the rock. Struggling through the pain, she hits Peri with the other side of the hilt of her sword in the head, the girl letting go, until Valencia kicks her in the chest, sending her back into the palm tree.

She considers stabbing again, but the pain in her hand is overwhelming, and Valencia cannot focus on anything else at the moment. Peri goes back to the left - her right - for the axe blade, moving rather sluggishly, but Valencia does not see that, as she hightails out of there, spinning around in the water, diving under. She can hear Peri get out of the pool, but Valencia is a fast swimmer, she's the _best swimmer_ \- Lance will never let her live it down - going in freestyle down the water. Behind her, occasionally, every few seconds or so, she can hear underwater the sound of the axe blade landing in the pool, returning, and landing again, but Peri does not seem to make her mark anywhere close.

Valencia reaches the end of the pool, not wasting anytime, leaping out of it, scrambling to her feet, running inside the steel building looming in front of her. Straight ahead, highlighted by a swinging light, is some sort of car attached to a wire, on a track. A- a _rollercoaster?_ The axe blade soars behind her, missing Valencia by a hair near her shoulder, embedded in the wall beside her. She glances behind her for a second, and Peri is rather hot on her heels, but still a ways back, her movement sluggish, slower than expected.

The Career reaches the coaster car, unsure of what to do, as it seems the only thing in the space is the entrance, and this coaster car. She turns around, Peri upon her, axe in hand, and the two collide, both falling back onto the cushioned seat of the coaster car. It is in a half-circle, sitting wide open, with four bars extended out a bit from them. Peri is on top of Valencia, trying to dig her axe blade into her chest. Valencia tries reaching for her sword with her free hand, blocking Peri's attempts with her casted wrist, the girl from Seven kicking the sword off of the coaster car.

It lurches into motion, and Valencia's breath increases tenfold. Oh my... _oh no._ The car is moving. She and Peri activated a rollercoaster. Valencia doesn't have a second to spare on that thought, as she returns to blocking Peri's axe digging into her, and the car climbs up some sort of incline, leaving her sword behind on the ground. Valencia knocks the axe out of Peri's grip, which seems to start slacking some, but the girl hisses at her, punching her in the nose with lightning speed, something she does not see coming.

The coaster climbs an incline, coming to a middle ground, flattening out, and Valencia struggles to sit upright. Peri withdraws the gladius from her back pocket, thrusting it forward. Valencia yelps again, blocking her arms in an X, which traps Peri's arm. She croaks a cry of surprise, but before Valencia can twist her casted arm to the right, the coaster car begins to spin, throwing both girls off balance and out of the booth. Valencia rolls up against the seat, scrambling again for Peri's gladius, while the girl is reaching for the axe, still resting behind her on the cushion. The coaster goes down some sort of slope, Valencia digging her good hand into the leather to brace herself, but the coaster isn't going extremely fast, thirty miles an hour or so, but still spinning.

Peri struggles to sit back down on the seat, and Valencia manages to snag the hilt of the gladius with her casted hand, dragging it close to her. Peri has the axe blade by this point, eyes locking with hers, and then the spinning car takes a violent turn, both girls crying out in surprise as they're ejected from the car. Valencia squeezes her eyes shut as she's temporarily by a harsh white light shining down on her. Peri seems to roll away some more, axe blade flying away from her. The gladius is nowhere to be seen, and now in the harsh light, as Valencia groans, unable to get to her feet, she sees the coaster car collide into a wall down at the other end, it crushing on impact. A breath catches in her throat. Had both of them been still stuck in the car, they both would have been dead.

Valencia looks at Peri, the girl looking back at her, and then back the axe blade which is in between them. The Career raises an eyebrow, as she notices that the glove that responded with the weapon is off of Peri's hand, skirted to the left of the girl instead, not lying with the weapon. The pad is still wrapped around the axe's blade, Valencia notices, and then she begins crawling straight at the weapon. Peri's crawl is beyond slow, Valencia realizes, as she moves, groaning in pain, both hands killing her, knees on fire, head swimming in murky, smoky liquid.

Why is the girl crawling so slow?

The axe doesn't seem to respond to the glove! Someone must be wearing it!

She leaps, with all her might, at the axe, fingers just barely glancing it, it knocking out of the way. She cusses to herself, crawling forward again. Valencia's hand just barely touches the end of it, but by this point, Peri is almost at the glove, her fingers trying to snag onto the material. The Career's eyes widen. She doesn't know where the gladius is, and she's too injured to search this basin, wherever they may be, wherever the weapon may be. She must strike first! If Peri gets the glove, the axe returns to her, and if the axe returns to her, Valencia can kiss life goodbye.

Valencia pulls the axe towards her, struggling to get to her feet, her entire body on fire. The axe begins to shake in her hands, seemingly wanting to pull towards Peri, who has the glove in her hands by this point, but her movements are slower than slow, as if she is back on Interview Night, moving without the help of Linden or the audience's sympathy... like she has leukemia.

Peri is trying to force the glove onto her hand, but it isn't working, and Valencia cannot bend her knees lest her body screams in pain. She grits her teeth, remembering what Marcus said to her in the Hall of Mystery.

 _You're a failure. You let all of your allies die. You will die in this arena. You are nobody. You are nothing. You are not going to be remembered when you're gone. You will have no one looking out for you. You have failed, Valencia! You failed to break the mold! You failed to be something different! You're just a stereotype! You're the worst tribute in the world!_

"No..." she tells herself. "I'm Valencia Shale."

Valencia picks the axe up, and screams, scaring Peri to death, she dropping the glove.

Exerting all the force she can muster in her body, Valencia races at the other girl a few feet away. Peri looks up, and it is the last thing she will ever do.

Screaming with the entire world behind her, Valencia swings the axe at Peri. The swing contains it all, her rage at Milor for hitting her, her rage at Maisey for disrespecting her. Her rage as she isn't the one to kill Annabellina who roasts her jewel Persephone alive. Her rage at Marcus's words, which are not true. Her rage at the Capitol. There is nothing else around her except Valencia and her rage.

Valencia screams, and swings. Peri screams likewise, raising her hands, the life sinking out of her.

The axe blade cuts just next to her neck, entering at the right shoulder, carving down into her chest, blood pooling out of the wound, and Valencia watches as all the life in Peri's body sinks away, her limbs becoming small, all of her hair falling to the floor, and then, with the blade, most likely a sponsor gift Valencia assumes, still embedded in her body, the girl falls back onto the floor, unmoving, swallowed up by the swinging halcyon light above them.

Somewhere, _everywhere,_ a cannon fires.

She collapses to her knees, letting out a yell, screaming at the ceiling, tears pouring down her face.

Trumpets sound, the fanfare of forever, Lewlyn's excited voice crying on the wind.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you our victor for the 100th Hunger Games, the 4th Quarter Quell, from District 1, Miss Valencia Shale!" Lewlyn cries.

" _Oh, look at that,"_ Valencia tells herself, almost giggling inwardly, as the scream dissipates. " _I- I won..._ "

* * *

 **2nd: Peri Florence, District 7 Female, 16. Killed by Valencia Shale. Created by LordShiro. I don't know where to begin, guys, on Peri. Initially, Shiro submitted her to me as a bloodbath, but I don't like bloodbath characters and try to flesh out whoever I can and however I can... and I knew right then and there, she'd be the antagonist everyone knew she could be, with having a real motive to live, leukemia and all, a real reason to fight, where'd you love her, where'd you fall for her every time, until she'd do things you didn't like... most of you were rooting for, most of you wanted her to win, but I just couldn't bear myself to do it. Peri, I loved you more than you know, and I have to say, you fought desperately, fought like a champion... but that strength serum didn't last forever, and when it left, it resorted you to the normal state you once were. Infamous in creation, infamous in demise. I loved you, my fading flower.**

* * *

 **1st/Victor of the 4th Quarter Quell: Valencia Shale, District 1 Female, 17 [ _Submitted by Audmirable_ ]**

 **2nd: Peri Florence, District 7 Female, 16, killed by Valencia Shale via axe cut in half.**

 **3rd: Linden Hazel, District 7 Male, 14, killed by Peri Florence via knife to the heart.**

 **4th: Milor Drusus, District 2 Male, 18, killed by Linden Hazel via head smashed in by rock.**

 **5th: Carrion Bastion, District 4 Male, 18, killed via rigged Tribute Vote-off by bullet hole wounds.**

 **6th: Colt Sheppard, District 12 Male, 18, killed by Milor Drusus via sword to the chest.**

 **7th: Caiden Grove, District 11 Male, 17, killed by Colt Sheppard via slit throat.**

 **8th: Annabellina Circuit, District 5 Female, 16, killed by a mutt via fire explosion.**

 **9th: Persephone Castor, District 2 Female, 18, killed by Annabellina Circuit via being burnt alive by a flamethrower.**

 **10th: Alexandra Quinn, District 10 Female, 17, killed by Caiden Grove via an eroded throat from a poisoned apple.**

 **11th: Marcus Pharadane, District 1 Male, 18, killed by Carrion Bastion via shard of glass to the skull.**

 **12th: Hero Slade, District 10 Male, 15, killed by Marcus Pharadane via slit throat.**

 **13th: Maisey Rovneay, District 4 Female, 17, killed by Marcus Pharadane via arrow to the head.**

 **14th: Rochelle Pascal, District 3 Female, 15, killed by Peri Florence via axe to the back of the skull.**

 **15th: Edwin Bishop, District 5 Male, 15, killed by a mutt via slit throat.**

 **16th: Corvus Raynott, District 6 Male, 15, killed by Persephone Castor via skull bashed in by a Warhammer.**

 **17th: Marissa Herdier, District 9 Female, 17, killed by Milor Drusus via stabbed in the stomach.**

 **18th: Victoria Armstrong, District 10 Female, 15, killed by Tribute Vote-off (Six Votes: Carrion, Annabellina, Corvus, Peri, Linden, and Marissa)**

 **19th: Blake Hanley, District 9 Male, 18, killed by Marcus Pharadane via arrow to the back of the skull.**

 **20th: Marina Penweather, District 8 Female, 13, killed by Caiden Grove via sword to the heart.**

 **21st: Galiant Rushmohone, District 8 Male, 15, killed by Valencia Shale via falling on spike to the chest.**

 **22nd: Gaia Whisp, District 12 Female, 13, killed by Maisey Rovneay via beheading.**

 **23rd: Lowelle Sable, District 6 Female, 17, killed by Annabellina Circuit via stab wound.**

 **24th: Deacon Fincher, District 3 Male, 13, killed by Carrion Bastion via snapped neck.**

* * *

 **Ladies and gentlemen, I am sobbing into tears. As I have mentioned before, this is my sixth attempt at an SYOT... and I have reached the victor stage. I have actually finished the tribute or arena arc of an SYOT, and there are tears in my eyes, as I cannot believe it's finally happened. Somehow, guys, I did it, and these characters were the most amazing group of characters I've ever written in my life, and I thank all of you for the honor of doing this SYOT. We aren't done yet, but more on that in a second.**

 **First, I just have to say, that might have been the most amazing - it _is_ the most amazing, actually - action sequence I have ever written in my life. I did this entire chapter in one sitting, around 7 or so, I'm sure, and it is 9:30, 9k later, I'm exhausted, inspired, and crying my eyes out. I hope, in all sincerity, that the song choice was amazing, and that it reached crescendo at the very end when Valencia sliced Peri in the neck, as that is the moment I was hoping for, because the song is amazing. **

**Secondly, we have a victor! My first victor ladies and gentlemen! My first _fucking_ victor goes to Madam Valencia Shale, our District 1 female, a seventeen year-old Career who wanted to break the mold. She was created by the wonderful Audmirable, so go and give them some love for this absolutely terrific tribute creation, now turned VICTOR! She was always in my top three choices, the moment I was given her, and after I sent Persephone, Annabellina, and Caiden to their demises, I knew straight away I wanted her in the final two, I wanted her there... but who to fight? And, would she win? Well... guys, she has. I know that it is an odd choice to do, to have Careers win SYOTS, but she was my pick, and I am over the moon.**

 **We are not finished, as Chapters 47 through 50 will be our epilogue of the Capitol arc, now including into the drama, our Valencia Shale as victor, which ought to spice things up. If you want, go and read specifically - including Chapter #17: Impressing the Devil - the Capitol arc storyline exclusively, if you wish to catch yourself up and understand what's going on, because we're far from over, guys, we're just getting started.**

 **Please, oh please review! I am dying to know all the thoughts sitting in your head, the same surely sitting in mine. If you can indulge me, submitters and readers, with your fellow submitters and readers, make one last list of the tributes, as best you can recall them - going a ways back now - on who you love, like, neutrally felt about, disliked, hated, loved to hate, and hated to love, as you felt when they died... opinions should be interesting.**

 **Once again, we have our victor. Round of applause to Valencia Shale from District 1. Our next chapter, Chapter #47: Champagne Losers, kicks off our epilogue, which you don't want to miss. I love you all so much, and I am still crying. Can't stop crying, haha. Have a wonderful day guys! Bye! Can't believe what I've done! Love you all!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	47. Champagne Losers (Epilogue I)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #47: Champagne Losers, our very first epilogue chapter, one of four, and this is the immediate aftermath after the end of the 4th Quarter Quell, the 100th Hunger Games inside an amusement park with a Hall of Horrors, a Hall of Mystery, a botanical garden with a murderous butterfly, a Cornucopia surrounded by high rise buildings and pavement, a murdering trash can, a forest of wooden coaster structure supports, and an oasis leading to an indoor rollercoaster has ended... with Valencia Shale from District 1 rising through the ashes, casting down 23 other tributes in her wake, two successful kills, as our victor. Hope you enjoy Chapter #47: Champagne Losers, where I try to not make the wordcount 9k lol.**

* * *

 ** _Kevia Janelle: Victor of the 84th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

She wants a cigarette so badly that whenever her stomach growls, it is not due to the lacking of food, but that her inner walls bemoan for nicotine, to inhale the fumes from a white stick of death. Kevia isn't sure, however, that the cigarette isn't meant to light, and then jam into Lance's eye, her fellow victor, and supposed 'friend' standing beside her, the two stuck in a hospital room. The sound of an IV drip fills the precocious silence, with Lance sighing every few seconds or so, and she can see his shoulders rise and fall when he inhales, doing so in an exaggerated manner. Kevia just wants that stupid cigarette.

Her greatest triumph - winning the Hunger Games isn't that, but having a victor certainly is - lays in front of her, covered up a hospital gown and a sickly green bedsheet that looks like the remnants of her fifth vodka tonic she throws up in that toilet last night after Lance's words rush back into her head, a cloudy serenity falling over her while she sits on some chair on the deck of the apartment floor, sunbathing. Valencia is sound asleep, a trickle of dried blood stuck underneath her nose, her left hand wrapped up in a different form of a cast, after Kevia and Lance scrounge up all the money they can think of to get her to stay alive. She just cannot believe that someone she physically mentored managed to survive such an atrocity like the Games. Kevia knows that her experience of not viewing the Games in some traumatic way isn't the same way for everyone, which Lance sharply points out, scalpel in between her ribs, but her darling little girl suffers and suffers _and suffers,_ they never seem to end up until the moment Peri dies, an axe embedded in her neck.

"How do you think she'll take it?" Kevia whispers to Lance, trying not to awaken Valencia. Neither one of them want to return to the apartment, as the entire building has emptied out and they're the only two left. All of the other victors have gone home except for Hale and Arizona, but Kevia tries not to think about that, biting down on her tongue till the lucid, bitter taste of copper floods the basin.

"In shock," Lance surmises with a frown. "They all do."

"I didn't."

"Of course you didn't," he scoffs with a shake of his head. "You never experience anything similar to any of us mere mortals."

"I was just-" she starts to explain herself.

"You don't have to explain anything, Kevia. You're always _just_ explaining stuff," Lance pinches the bridge of his nose. "Frankly, I'm getting utterly sick and tired of the fighting. I don't want to do it anymore, and besides," he juts his head towards the new victoress, "We have to piece Valencia Shale back together again."

Kevia tries to ignore the IV drip, which sounds similar to blood splattering on the edge of her porcelain tub as she runs her fingers back and forth over the sharp, serrated cracks that reveal themselves when she shifts around, water sloshing out of the tub and onto the dirty tiled floor. The crunch of broken porcelain as Lance walks into her bathroom, wrapped up for the winter weather outside, and she looks at him, hatred in her eyes.

" _You are going to catch pneumonia, Kevia, if you keep doing this."_

 _"Leave me alone," she splashes water at him. "I'll mourn how I want to."_

 _The drip begins, as she rests an elbow on the edge, balancing between wobbliness and stalwart strength. Lance frowns, hearing it too, the occasional droplet of blood missing its mark. "What's that noise?"_

 _"My blood hitting the tile."_

Kevia jars herself out of the memory, out of the mourning state, but she cannot look at Lance, as he'll ask her what's wrong, and then the wormhole will open all over again. The walls of the hospital room are a muted white, almost to the point where Kevia feels like the room goes on forever, where she'll stick her hand through some hole and never be able to wrench herself free. Valencia's breathing lightly, by the sheet rising and falling up and down, but her breaths are shallower compared to Lance's foghorn bellows, and he sniffles, wiping at his nose.

She's never had a victor. Now she has one, all due to Bonnie's generosity. The girl is Bonnie's favorite, as she's mentioned before at other outings, holding onto skinny martini bases and drinking merrily, her face flushed. How can Kevia repay such a gift? She doggedly thinks of Hale and her stupid hair color, but that is cut off by Valencia's eyes opening, squinting together, her protégé trying to launch herself forward.

Both victors from District 1 extend their reach to her, holding out their hands. "Easy, easy there Val," Lance speaks to her first, gently, softly. Kevia watches him in amazement, a side of him she's never seen. As far as she's aware, he never married, doesn't have a wife, hasn't had a girlfriend since becoming a victor... but he's treating Valencia like his daughter as if he's been parenting his entire life. A flare of jealousy spirals in the woman's gut. Another gift she doesn't have. A luxury she doesn't have, as Bonnie has the kids, Bonnie is pregnant, Lance has the fatherly instincts, and she- she's the whore who can't get a man to sleep with her. "Take it easy."

Valencia's eyes are wide, searching Lance's face for familiarity, and she looks at her broken hand, at the hospital gown, which is also plain white, a slight blemish of drool down by her right shoulder. "Where- where am I?"

"You're in the Capitol," Kevia croaks out.

Her protégé looks at her, thunder flashing in her eyes, lips parting, as if she is unable to believe what she's looking at directly in front of her. "Kevia?" she asks, furrowing her eyebrows.

Despite her best efforts telling herself not to be motherly, to be distant like she always is, Kevia cannot but help herself and sit at the new victor's bedside, gripping her broken hand, rubbing her thumb in a circle around her pointer finger, as soothingly as she could. "Good to see you too, sweetheart," she whispers.

"How are you feeling?" Lance asks.

Valencia swallows, gaze looking down her body. There's two thick straps holding her down by the waist section, so Valencia is incapable of fully lifting her body to a sitting position. "Why- why am I strapped down?" a hint of fear creeps in her voice, and Kevia's blood turns to ice. Her girl is never fearful, never runs in the sight of danger... what did the arena do to her?

Her fellow victor locks his jaw, staring at the strap as if it'd warp into a mutant like in the arena, and Kevia witnesses the way his shoulders tense up again, as if he is going to try and protect himself from a menace. "You were thrashing around in your sleep. Doctors said nightmares, probably, and they didn't want you to injure yourself."

"How long have I been asleep?"

"Two days," Kevia swallows a lump in her throat. She expects a celebration the moment Valencia collapses to her knees and screams, exhausted from the nine days of suffering, to only be immediately placed in a hovercraft and injected with a sleep serum. As Kevia is forcing her way towards the doctor that issues the injection, going to throttle him with a taste of his own medicine - the irony is ham fisted there, she knows - when a Peacekeeper forces her back - " _Just a test,_ " the doctor says towards her, backing away, rubbing Valencia's forehead with his gloved hand. " _Stay away from her!"_ Kevia screams at the doctor, and the Peacekeeper pushes a bit harder, Lance's hands guiding her out of the emergency room, firm on her shoulders. "Doctors were running tests to make sure you were okay. A lot of trauma apparently," and Kevia's skin itches as if she's bathing in a bathtub filled to the brim with centipedes.

Valencia looks at her cast, that she is able to lift, and it has been swapped out for a dark black color, wrapped around her hand in a strange snake coil, as if an ouroboros is trying to eat her hand whole, starting opposite at the pinkie and thumb, the way it is twined that part of her arm is revealed every few inches, but just a glimpse. "And my hand?"

Lance rubs his chin. "The doctors were able to accelerate the healing process, so it'll be fully functional in a week," he gives a weak smile. Kevia's seen that smile, over martinis and foot rubs and screaming matches, where that smile is supposed to fix all of the problems in the world, but all she hears and sees is the problems mounting higher and higher, like a stinking pile of corpses, all the tributes killed in the Games. He resumes rubbing his thumb across her knuckles, like the rivets in a piece of machinery. "They can't fully heal you," and then softer, to where only Kevia could hear him, "And they couldn't heal Peri either."

The new victor, the girl from District 1 - _she no longer goes by that title,_ Kevia has to remind herself, constantly, _she's Valencia Shale, a Quarter Quell victor, and damaged beyond belief -_ bends her fingers upwards, curling them, causing Lance to move his hand, and she tightens the arm closer to her chest. "How'd it all end?" she flicks her gaze between both of them.

Kevia stops circling the finger with her thumb, as she can tell it is not providing her with any comfort whatsoever, all just a massive fail atop the other. She cannot stop failing. She fails herself, she fails Hale, she's failed Valencia... she's failing Bonnie concurrently atop all the rest. "Calhoun's strength serum he injected Peri with ran out, would go out in the final two," she cannot help the smile that creeps out and drags her lips outwards, like a taut string. "Bad luck I'd say she ended up fighting the best Career in the Games history." Lance flashes her a look, eyes dangerous, but she shrugs at him. What would a little hyperbole hurt now? The girl is dead, her tribute is alive, and has now won. She's safe and not rotting away in a slovenly made wooden box.

Valencia tries to sit up, but she manages to get slightly higher by extending her neck back, shifting on the pillow some. "Are people mad? I know that everyone can feel bitter about a Career victor. It's been years, right?" she asks, for confirmation.

Lance chews on the inside of his cheek. "Of course no one will ever, in the history of the Games, be entirely happy with the outcome," he raises his head some, and a bit of the confidence Kevia knows so well reveals itself. "The gap was larger than you think. Apparently Peri killing her district partner before the very end was very frowned upon... District 7 is more family oriented than some other districts," the tone drops somewhat, and he cannot bear to look Valencia in the eye, gaze falling onto the heart monitor. "A lot of people began to take pity on you, I think. Being betrayed by your own district partner, and-"

"You don't have recite them all to me," Valencia turns her head, and it is the girl Kevia has always known returning slightly, her armor coming out, shedding this weak and soft exterior. "I know what happened to me in the games."

A lock of hair falls down onto her face, and Valencia reaches to grab the strand, to brush it out of the way, and Kevia's heart catches in her throat. _Oh dear._ The new victor stares at the locks in confusion, letting go of them and they fall back down to where she touches them. A wild look of confusion takes hold. "About that..." she begins.

"Why-" Valencia's voice breaks off, as if this is the most upsetting thing since she has woken up. "Why is my hair color different?"

It's the truth. Kevia watches Valencia get rolled through the doctor's laboratory to test vital sign durability, and she gets tired waiting on the window, yearning for bed. Coming in yesterday to check on her, she stops a few moments after greeting the sleeping victor, one hand rested on the door, the other absentmindedly shifting through her hair. It's the hair. Valencia's hair is different.

Her protégé, her greatest accomplishment... she had vivacious, bright, gorgeous blonde hair.

Now, dyed black, like the poisonous smog rising from the District 8 smokestacks, like Kevia's lungs smoking those damned cigarettes.

Lance pats her on the hand that has now fallen back to the girl's side. "Calhoun and Bonnie Rodney both requested it be changed," and Valencia's eyes widen, face impasse with hurt. "Apparently blonde hair towards most of the districts speaks of privilege, authoritarianism..." he clenches his jaw, "Doesn't help that the two leaders of Panem have blonde hair, and that you're a District 1 Career victor after years and years of a drought..." Lance shakes his head. "Darker hair, specifically black, after a few polls, seems more trustworthy to the populace. And so-"

"And so they changed your hair color," Kevia interrupts. "And you can't change it back. Forbidden."

"Forbidden?" Valencia repeats, and she begins to inhale and exhale very rapidly, and Kevia braces herself to leap into action. _A panic attack?_

"I'm sorry, Valencia," and she realizes she means it. She's never meant something more in her life than this exact moment, she'll swear on all the items she's stolen from Bonnie in the past, that stupid jade necklace, to a gorgeous corset that flies away from her on the back of one of the trains, to a delightful cashmere sweater Lance rips up in an argument, he setting a match to it, and Kevia watches her whole world burn - she _was_ that cashmere sweater - and evaporate into ashes, falling onto the tile. She doesn't speak to him for a whole month.

The new victor sniffles, wiping at her nose, which has begun to run. "It's okay," she rationalizes, after a moment, and Lance shifts back some, giving her space. "It- it's better than being dead."

"That it is, my sweet girl," Lance agrees, stroking the now piece of dark hair out of her eyes, which are still the same color, luckily. Kevia takes a deep breath of relief, standing up and moving a bit from the bed, gravitating towards the fringes, towards the front door.

She wrings her hands together, palms starting to sweat obnoxiously. "We're going to have to let Calhoun know you're up," Kevia shakes her own blonde locks. " _If Bonnie ever thought she could force me to change my hair color, I'd kill her with the comb and lodge it into her windpipe,"_ she thinks to herself, and then aloud, "You know what happens next."

Valencia nods, and her eyebrows furrow together. Game-time, and Kevia's seen that look a lot of her protege's face. "An interview with Pollux in front of all of Panem. Televised live."

Lance stands likewise, but he still stays by the girl's bedside. "The interview was to be scheduled for an evening time slot, whenever you were to wake up," he smiles, genuinely. "Valencia, do you have any idea how proud we are of you?"

"You don't have to tell me," but there is no hint of a smile edging on her lips. Valencia does not utter a thank-you, or any sort of conjecture like it, causing Kevia to furrow her eyebrows together. "I know how everyone back home is proud of me. Everyone here in the Capitol is proud of me," and she turns to look at the wall, as if there were to be a window instead that she looks out of it, but it is wall paper and that hideous paintjob. "And how in every other district, they're all pissed I came home before them, and that they were shipped home in wooden _fucking_ crates," Valencia hisses.

Kevia bristles at that, awkwardly balancing on one of her heels. She's never heard her girl, always composed, always prim, always proper, _ever_ curse. Cursing brought lashes in the Academy, and Lance has had to brutalize poor Marcus once or twice a week when his language got out of control, past the point of a stern warning. Dismissal wasn't an option by the time the two were seventeen and sixteen, only a year ago, and very lethal. She and Lance lock eyes. How not normal is this supposed to be? It's all been off, and Kevia's heart can't take it, she knows it'll give out at any moment.

Her fellow victor exhales a shaky breath, rocking back on his heels too, making his way over to Kevia. "The hospital staff will be here to help you change, help you get accustomed to walking again, feed you... stuff like that," he moves past her, past Kevia, one foot now out the door. "I'll see you tonight, Valencia. Congratulations."

She has nothing to say to her now, disappointment starting to flood her veins, appearing as bile down in her throat, and so she departs after him likewise, to hear a thank-you that will never come, as she misses Valencia then sob her eyes out, bringing a hand to her mouth to stifle the broken, jagged scream.

Kevia's heart would have ripped in three.

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: Victor of the 100th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

It's just an interview. How hard could it be?

"The hardest thing in my life..." she mutters to herself, messing with an earring backstage. Valencia stands behind the curtains, the trumpet fanfare, Panem's theme song, booming around the amphitheater, the raucous roar of applause and jeering, cheering, and screaming from the adoring audience following suit, and the echoes of her own crying vibrating in her skull. Valencia squeezes her eyes shut, as even through the curtain, the stage lights are bleeding through, rips in the sky dripping halcyon ichor down to her, to lapel up and taste, the blood of the gods heavenly and desirous.

The crowd uproars again as Valencia sees movement from behind the curtain, a single lone figure stepping out, and her heart skips a beat. Pollux Aetos, the Master of Ceremonies, and probably the last person she wants to see standing on that stupid stage right now. Bile rises in her throat, Valencia swallowing it down, it burning and bitter the entire way back through her esophagus. Pollux waves to the crowd, standing in between two white seats, furnished and glittering in the stage lights. Something unintelligible is said about the Quell, or at least that is what she assumes, as the way the crowd applauds and cheers, and there's another round of trumpet fanfare.

Valencia flinches at the sudden noise, which is blasting just behind her skull, as if someone is standing right behind her and playing it over a speaker. She doesn't want to do this, she doesn't want to do this. She wants to be back in that arena, standing underneath that waterfall as it hits her skin, creating iodine rivers down her back, eyes closed, back with her blonde hair. The victor holds a lock of hair in her fingers, twirling it round and round, and she can almost not see it due to the shadows. How they mutilated her. How they mutilated everything about her.

She thinks, quite passingly, as she may cry if she goes further into the thought, that her darling queen of the Underworld, Persephone... she has - _had,_ Valencia corrects herself - dark hair, luscious dark hair. Valencia wants to bury her head into it and sob.

Pollux motions his hand to her corner of the stage, stage left, and she catches the brunt end of his statement. "...Please make a loud and warm welcome, ladies and gentlemen, all across Panem, for your new victor of the 4th Quarter Quell, Miss Valencia Shale!"

The crowd gets to their feet, cheering and screaming her name left and right, almost like a chant. Valencia inhales a shaky breath, puts on her best smile, and emerges from the curtain. The cheering gets louder the moment she reveals herself to the audience, and her name rises higher and higher over the fanfare, over Pollux's voice, over her own heartbeat. She makes her way to him easily enough, she thinks, in a rather straight line with only a stumble or two. Damned, _damned heels._

Valencia makes it to Pollux, the Master of Ceremonies extending his arms out for a hug, but she stops in the dead center of stage, in front of her chair, not finishing the gesture. He clears his throat, eyes flashing a dangerous silver color, and instead extends one arm out for a handshake. Valencia grips it laxly, fingers slipping through the cracks and crevices, and when the two shift their hands up and down in the familiar motion, she ends the contact as quick as she can. She does not want him to touch her or talk to her more than it is necessary. Pollux's face darkens when turned towards her, but as he turns back to the crowd, his face brightens immensely.

She takes a seat first, as would be the custom, and because he is supposed to be a gentleman. " _He's a rat, not a gentleman,_ " Valencia hisses to herself. " _As long as he lives here, he'll never be a gentleman._ "

Kevia's words still echo in her head, when she comes back to greet her after she's changed, and wiped out the mascara from her lashes. Her mentor takes her hands, squeezing it, a fake smile pushing her lips to their limit. "Whatever you really feel inside, Valencia, you have to keep inside. All of Panem is watching this interview, and you cannot be changed," Valencia goes to protest, but the elder victor raises her hand. "You can't. The Capitol, especially is watching. You have to be grateful that you're alive, grateful to be given the opportunity. Unrelenting, like the Career the Academy has trained you to be... and you cannot balk at the footage they'll show."

"And what if I don't want to be their little doll?" Valencia retorts, trying to pull her hands away. This is not the lifesaving sort of advice she expects after being awoken from her hospital bed. "What if I refuse?"

All the light in Kevia Janelle's eyes dissipate in seconds, flickering out and shattering with a bulb smashing into the concrete floor. "Then you die," she says gravely. "Then we all die."

Pollux is dressed handsomely in dark red and black, a suave jacket outlined with velvet adorning the insides, hair cropped back and gelled, white teeth sparkling on display, and Valencia senses the hostility. She looks out towards the audience, but can hardly see the first row due to the shining suns hanging on a rafter above their heads, extended out from the amphitheater. Pollux seems to move over and touch her hand, but she catches it out of the corner of her eye, reflexively moving it away. Red alarms flash in her head as the interviewer locks his jaw, but the smile is still shining his eyes.

She just needs to stick to the script.

Valencia closes her eyes, just wanting the ordeal to be over. An hour long interview. How can she even talk about the Games for that long of a time?

"My, my, my," Pollux fans himself, now grinning from ear to ear. "You certainly look beautiful tonight, Miss Shale! Doesn't she folks?" he turns to the crowd, and they cheer her name, a few sharp whistles riding the air.

" _You're gayer than Milor ever was,_ " Valencia thinks to herself, and that drags out a slight smirk. "Thank you, Pollux. I wish I could say the same for you."

The audience upheaves with laughter, and there's mirth in Pollux's voice, but those eyes hardline, and his gaze burrows into her. Valencia is dressed, although the audience cannot tell since she's facing them, in a backless, suave, amaranthine colored dress that flows all the way down to her feet, adorned by delightfully colored cardinal heels. Blood splashes her toes, and Valencia flinches when she's put the shoes on for the first time. Her now dark hair - she'll lament this for years and years to come, harboring hatred in her veins - is curly, resting on her shoulders, bobbing whenever she moves.

 _Stick to the script, stick to the script._

She smiles to herself, a wicked smile, one totally detracting from her character. " _Fuck the script..._ " her thought booms from her skull, and Valencia cracks her knuckles.

Pollux wipes at his eyes, with fakery in the extension of the swipe. There's no tears coming from his eyes, the absolute cunt. "Good one, Valencia," the kind act of respect dropped rather fast, she tells herself. "Onto a more serious topic, how are you feeling right now, at this very moment?"

The new victor eyes him directly, and there's a mental battle going on between them, his gaze glinting off of the stage lights. A dare, extending a hand and bending the fingers in a ' _come at me_ ' fashion, and oh boy, how she'll accept that invitation, licking the sealed envelope over and over again until she dies due to poisoning of the liver. "I don't want to be here," she says, and the laughter from the crowd dissipates immediately, breaking like water crashing onto a rock. "I'd rather be back in that oasis paradise, the only time I felt truly happy in the arena, before, well..." Valencia trails off, not wanting to utter the girl's name. It is ill to speak of the dead in an unfavorable light, especially if they do not deserve the criticisms. That girl, that faded flower from Seven, she's just trying to survive, and now she's gone. Her hands are shaking, Valencia realizes. "I also don't want to be on this stage, being interviewed by you. I don't like you." Another hush falls across the crowd, and Valencia knows that Kevia is ripping her hair out, screaming at the top of her lungs.

The Master of Ceremonies leans back in his chair, crossing his legs together, and there's a hint of confusion in his eyes, but bitter resolve smoothing out the creases of his mouth. "And why's that, Valencia? I want to be liked by everyone who sits on this stage."

"You made me feel like I was a joke," she tells him. "That I was nothing, worthless, and didn't deserve to be a Career from One. You told me that I wouldn't win, and that my body was unflattering."

"You must've misunderstood my intentions, I-" Pollux tries to interrupt.

Valencia's eyes produce thunder and lightning, and she sits upright. Screw this pretentious script. "You told me, Mr. Aetos, the moment I sat down, to the audience, 'Will she live up to her training score or not?" she recalls the way the audience laughs, she's taken aback, and she wants to throttle him in the throat. "You told me I was different from other District 1 girls because I didn't have the older form as the ones before one, because I was more muscular," she leans in. "You ended my interview without even telling me 'the best of luck', which you did for all the rest. Every. Other. Tribute," Valencia's eyes glean off the lights as likewise. She shakes her head, getting to her feet. "Screw this," she mutters under her breath.

"What are you doing?" the interviewer looks around wildly, and this time, there is panic in his eyes. Full-fledged panic.

" _Good,_ " Valencia tells herself, " _Like what I felt with Peri and her flaming axe..._ " she stands up straight, head high, shoulders back. "I could sit on this stage and watch the footage of the arena all day long. I'd be upset, sure, as I had to kill people wanting to survive like me, but I wanted to live too, so it had to be done..." she can picture Kevia throwing Lance against a wall now, drowning in a sea of crimson rage. "I can watch Galiant fall onto that metal spike, you can show me Marcus slitting Hero's throat open, or me sending an axe into Peri's neck, or even Persephone," her voice cracks at that, tears prickling at the edges of her vision, "Being burnt alive... but you are not going to discredit me while I sit here like you did two weeks ago. I fought my entire life to get where I am now, to have dissenters everywhere tell me I wasn't good enough. That I wasn't pretty enough, and it looks like winning the Hunger Games didn't change that," Valencia shakes her head again. "I'm not going to stand for this, Mr. Aetos. I'm sorry..."

The victor turns on her heels, walking back the same way she came, Pollux's voice trying to get her to sit back down, to come and return to the chair to resume the interview, as they'll start over, they'll begin anew and fix the issues of their past relationship - _there is no relationship,_ she snarks, _you aren't Milor, or Carrion, or Marcus, or Maisey, or Persephone, or Hero, or Annabellina, or Peri, or Galiant, or Victoria... you're just another Capitol pawn_ \- but she's gone, off the stage, and she is taking her heels off as she walks, stumbling forward some.

No Peacekeepers come to rush at her with their guns and their blizzard white armor. No Kevia throwing her against a wall and calling her ugly and stupid and hideous. No President Calhoun throwing her back into an arena. She's allowed to leave.

They can't force her to do anything like that anymore.

Valencia will simply not allow it.

* * *

 ** _Bonnie Rodney: Designer of the Mutts P.O.V_**

* * *

She stands back a bit on the terrace overlooking the city circle, where the chariots encircle the streets, cheered on by adoring fans. Bonnie looks out across her high veranda, at the thousands, _hundreds of thousands_ of people watching, witnessing this glorious moment, a plethora of colors, all clamoring and talking while throwing their attention up to the balcony. There are a few lesser than normal, Bonnie realizes, due to the new victor's interview stunt, but with her and Calhoun watching through a monitor in their mansion, they were not going to force Valencia Shale to stand on that stage... they weren't cruel and vicious like that.

"Just cruel and vicious enough to make her fight to the death," she whispers to herself, rubbing her arms.

Valencia stands in the center of the balcony, on the red carpet that extends to the terrace outcropping which faces the city circle, Calhoun beside her, in front of a velvet pillow resting on a pedestal. The victor is tall and striking in the moonlight, the cool autumn air hitting Bonnie's skin, sending shudders down her back. She's dressed delightfully in a diamond blue dress, at the moment with her shoes off, blonde hair up in a bun, with Valencia still wearing her backless stained-glass purple sheen, which Bonnie wants right now. She reminds herself to ask Augustus for a design later. Calhoun is in a traditional black and white tuxedo, pearlish gloves on his hands, Bonnie expecting them to dye crimson any second now.

The crowning of Valencia Shale, a victor, from District One, of the 100th Hunger Games.

Bonnie takes a step forward into the shot, to make sure the cameras see her and all of her brilliance. Valencia straightens her back out some, and the First Lady tilts her head to the side some, a frown bringing wrinkles to her brow. There's a sense of tension, of fear, in the victor's eyes. Bonnie knows full and well, as they allow Valencia to walk off the stage, that they might have just stoked the fire to some rebellion in the ashes of Thirteen, or rising from their own Capitol for all she knows. The girl flat out tells the country, to Pollux's face, that they cannot force her to sit on that stage and relive her last nine days of horror.

She understands, slightly, but she'll try her best not to hold it against the poor girl. They'll simply have to schedule a follow-up, pressing the barrel of a gun to the back of the girl's head so she _understands,_ fully, the consequences of her actions. Wouldn't be best to paint the walls in brain matter, now, would it? They were freshly coated just a few hours ago for the occasion, to shine in the shot.

Calhoun picks up the crown to place on Valencia's head, a beautiful, gorgeous copper. Bonnie knows that copper usually meant third place, but it is a request from Kevia herself... the new victoress in the center adores copper, and it is the shedding of all of that copper that has gotten Valencia Shale to where she is right now. Holding the crown firmly in his hands, he looks at her, looks through her.

"This is for you, my darling," he whispers to her. Bonnie frowns. When's the last time her husband ever called her something adoring like that? "A crown for a queen."

Valencia nods, but then catches sight of the ornament, her breath leaving her. "It- it's beautiful. Thank you."

Calhoun rests the copper crown on Valencia's head, the now dark waves of hair matching perfectly with the sheen of bronze glinting off of the much more dim stage lights, responding to the haze of moonlight outside. The moment her husband rests the crown atop the scalp, the audience watching in the stands, craning their necks to see just for an instance a moment of glory, break into raucous applause, and Valencia actually breaks a smile. Bonnie didn't know she could smile.

"Congratulations, Valencia Shale, victor of the 4th Quarter Quell. Your district will be very proud of you."

"I'm proud of myself," the girl admits, a blush creeping up to her cheeks, but all the hair on Bonnie's arms stand up. Something about her, something about this victor from District One has ensnared her ever since the training score day with that horrendous Lewlyn, from her strength, to her boldness, to her courage, and even down to her humility... and Bonnie wants to drink it all in, relish in the presence of someone truly mighty, truly powerful.

Calhoun steps back to allow Valencia a moment to breathe, but Bonnie replaces him, lightly pushing her husband out of the way.

She throws her arms around the girl in a hug, making sure to squeeze at the center of her back where Valencia will feel it the hardest.

"Congratulations, my dear," she says, picking something neutral.

"Thank you."

Bonnie extends herself backwards, arms holding out onto Valencia's sides, eyes flickering up the crown. "You look gorgeous. The crown suits you," and her eyes then fall a bit downwards, onto the locks of black hair, curled even tighter, resting on her shoulders, and her mouth forms a hard line. "I'm sorry about the hair color change. We almost didn't go through with it."

Valencia's stare is enough to send a lance of ice through her own heart, ' _But you did, and you've affected me,_ ' but on the outside, she smiles faintly, the rose on her cheeks popping out in the lighting. "It's okay, Madam President."

The blonde woman raises an eyebrow. _Madam President?_ No one has ever mistaken her for her husband, they look nothing alike. No one has ever graced her the respect she has always thought she deserved, nor given her the title in any sort. She's the mutt designer, the creator of nightmares, Calhoun's wife, the president's wife... a nobody with no background, no skills, no foray into politics that means a damn.

She laughs with mirth. "Thank you for the prestige, but I'm no 'Madam President'," she corrects her. "Just the president's wife," and she squeezes the girl's shoulder. "Not yet, at least," and Bonnie kisses her on the cheek, the girl's flesh warm. Warmth meant terror, in her book.

Calhoun looks behind at the two of them, extending a gloved hand, Valencia taking it, matching her - Bonnie's - husband at the terrace outcropping, and the audience roars in delight, leaping their feet in a standing ovation, all the while chanting her name, chanting the name of the girl who beat the odds, of the girl crowned with a copper vice, where the blood runs down her arms.

Bonnie stands behind the both of them, closing her eyes, picturing that the chanting is for her. That they're calling out Bonnie Rodney instead, where the voices multiply, riding the wave. She stares into Valencia Shale's exposed back, and if she squints extremely hard, imagining it with all of the power she can muster, Bonnie can depict a wound blossoming in the center of the pale flesh, until the cardinal rivers extend outwards, and the wound festers, and Valencia will collapse to her knees, succumbing to the pain.

Madam President has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?

"It certainly does..." Bonnie smiles to herself, relishing in the applause that has never been for her.

* * *

 **Woohoo, ladies and gents, that was Chapter #47: Champagne Losers, and I didn't do a stupidly long 9k chapter! Yes! So, we have breached the first chapter of the Epilogue, the epic conclusion to the Capitol storyline, and we've forayed into Valencia's journey as a victor. She's the central character of this chapter, will take a background role in the next chapter, elevate some at #49, and have a scene to herself in #50, but the primary focus in Bonnie, Lewlyn, Calhoun, and the others that this story has included.**

 **I have really enjoyed writing these Capitol chapters, and I think Valencia adds a whole lot to the presence of the piece, truthfully, but more on that later. Dire developments are underway, and it looks like Bonnie may be relishing more than she can handle, would you say? Next chapter, #48: Promises of a Liar will actually jump eight months ahead, as I wanted to include a very provincial moment - I'm sure you can all guess what it is - and then the rest of the story, the last three chapters, will kick off from there. Any last plot predictions for any of our Capitol characters of Calhoun - Bonnie - Lewlyn - Rennie - Pollux - Hector - Hale - Kevia - Lance - Arizona, and the new addition of Valencia. Each one of them still has a journey to complete, and I am curious of what you all think will come to pass. Please review, as it'd mean the world to me, and that we are almost at the end. Have a great day guys! Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	48. Promises of a Liar (Epilogue II)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #48: Promises of a Liar, which is our bridging epilogue chapter before the end, before the real end in two more chapters, as something glorious and painful and brutal and amazing will be happening on the morrow. This chapter will be a flash forward eight months from when Valencia is crowned, for story progression reasons as you'll soon find out, and then, from the third POV - there are four for this chapter - that is three weeks in advance; I would make this chapter two, but I wanted to squeeze all of it together for the next chapter. I am really excited, really,** ** _really_** **excited as I have a huge announcement when Sheep Led to Slaughter is finished, something I am pushing for like August 25th, which is next Sunday, but hopefully sometime between now and the end of the month, which gives me a couple days wiggle room. Hope you all enjoy Chapter #48: Promises of a Liar.**

* * *

 ** _Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis P.O.V_**

* * *

Eight months.

It's been eight months since the end of the 100th Quarter Quell, when Valencia dispatches Peri with a quick swipe of her sword. Since the end of time, since the end of all things good. The winding, ticking countdown until she counts all of her eggs in one basket in a row. A lot has happened in that eight months, Lewlyn realizes, and not all of it has to do with herself. Rennie picks up the violin for the first time ever since she gifts it to him on a wonderful winter day, snow painting the windowsills in a sheet of frost, a white blanket for her decadent marble to hide under, which has her mourning only for a few moments.

Just a moment or two, she swears it, in which her brother smiles as if he has a secret to share.

All the time away from playing the violin, five years at this point, have done nothing for his talent. Rennie Davis is not gifted in the art of speaking, something Lewlyn thinks about with a bitter distaste hitting her in the back of the throat, never a public speaker, and hated press parties and magazine interviews and the such... but he has a gift to touch the soul, to spread his love outwards in the way of music notes that would sing back to him. She's at his place, sipping glasses of cherry dark wine on his pristine white couch - he is the one with the white apartment, the clean heart, the clear heart she has so savagely destroyed - and his hands lightly touch the end piece of wood, running his finger faintly down the bowstrings, mouth parted open, pupils dilated, his breathing shallow, and Lewlyn has never seen her brother so taken by something in some time she has forgotten about.

And so he plays, with the mahogany violin, the auburn violin... too many colors make this violin, this gift. He plays with his eyes closed, Lewlyn incapable of keeping hers open, the two Davis siblings locked heart-in-heart with each other as the soulful notes waft all along his room. She recalls, with a hint of disdain - that she cannot help, no matter how hard she bites her tongue - at his silly little notion before she steals him away in the middle of the night, that Rennie believed - perhaps _believe,_ but she hasn't forged the question, as it would be an insult now - he can see the music notes fluttering with the stage lights, and Lewlyn knows she's eaten some particularly powerful mushroom at this point, as she can see the music notes this time around, dancing to the ceiling, and it is wonderful.

She is crying when he's finished, and so is he, but there are no tears down her brother's face, as she can feel the anguish from the way he plays, from the way he demonstrates himself, and she throws her arms around him in a hug, not caring truthfully about the violin at that point. Lewlyn is proud of her brother in a way she's never felt before, that he overcome his own oppression from his flesh and blood, and that she's forging her way in the world too, without burning it all down.

As they depart from the hug, Lewlyn wanting to go retrieve her wine glass, which is teetering uncomfortably like a game of seesaw on the couch's edge, Rennie kisses her. His lips catch onto hers, and a statement of hers is croaked down in surprise, Lewlyn gasping for breath as he presses himself towards her, and Lewlyn shakes at his touch. She's his, and he's hers, until the end of time, she realizes, how close they are, despite what has happened to them. Lewlyn understands, then, as the two get themselves together inwardly, as they break apart, that she _loves_ Rennie. Her brother is everything she isn't.

Patient.

Caring.

Loving.

" _Not mentally insane,_ " she has to chuckle to herself.

An expression of euphoria rests on Rennie's face, highlighting the glimmer in his eyes, and Lewlyn feels as if she's been zapped from the heavens.

He undoes her with a finger to the middle of her spine, she unknots the tension in his stomach. Rennie lights up the sky with his cardinal kisses and navy sighs. Lewlyn paints the hall with her blush that drips in rouge and adds her exultations to the portfolio of love. She presses a hand against his collarbone, Rennie always having been skinny, even in his youth, but before, when she used to press herself onto him in that manner - in _this manner,_ she has to correct herself - the skinniness is wholesome, and almost delectable. He has a hand resting against her face, a thumb stroking over porcelain lips, and she tastes like spring water, he tasting like firework smoke.

It is a relationship, Lewlyn comes to terms with, a few weeks later when she calls it a 'date', the instance of he and her going out to dinner together, which is moreso her talking over the horribly played trumpets, but beyond that, as she sets her hand on his even now, on her terrace, with the stars out, and the moon shining, Lewlyn has never been more at peace with herself.

Rennie's question, however, is what causes the peace to disrupt itself, to be moved off-kilter by an earthquake.

" _Why don't you rescind your offer?_ " is the question he signs out, but he's holding onto the tablet just in case, always a precautionary.

She frowns, creating wrinkles in her forehead. Lewlyn wants to stop frowning; too many wrinkles. "What do you mean?"

" _Backing out of going to jail._ "

Lewlyn scoffs, and there's a twinge of hurt that flashes across her brother's face, which has her sigh, and the Head Gamemaker looks out at the Capitol skyline, a neon painted canvas of technology and gluttony, where the liquidous turquoise, and the brightest hue of amaranthine known to man cannot blot out, or outshine the sickening grays beneath.

"Rennie, it isn't that simple." Oh, how she wishes it had been like that, if she had that ability to just close her eyes and wish her problems away, and that she wouldn't have to send herself to prison, because her brother is absolutely right. She doesn't have to, and if she didn't, no would know she had been planning to do such a thing, but it can no longer sit on her heart anymore, it'll positively destroy her.

" _Well, certainly, if you let Calhoun know..._ " every time her brother begins to type something on his tablet, or sign it via his hands, a flicker of light glimmers in his eyes, as if he has come up with the physical injection cure for cancer - _didn't work for Peri Florence,_ she thinks to herself, shuddering - and how he wants to share it with the world immediately, and her heart cannot stop breaking in two at the seams.

"He doesn't know, Rennie," Lewlyn extends her hand, to touch his, but he recoils from the touch slightly, a visible look of discomfort flashing across his face, and she hadn't seen a look like that out of him in who knows how long. "I haven't told Calhoun, because I am doing this all on my own. After we announce the end of the Hunger Games, I'm telling him to have me arrested," and she swallows, a breath she had been holding onto, which sinks into her stomach like a rock. "I'm scared Rennie, but it needs to be done. You can't change my mind."

He looks at her, and for a split second, all the hair on her arms stand straight up, as if there's been a electric shock zapped through her, a mental torture like no other, but all her brother does is shake his head; he doesn't even sign something out to her, he just staring, looking right at her, drilling a hole directly through her heart. Lewlyn's lips part, perhaps to speak, but the two of them just look at one another, until Rennie, this time, grabs the tablet instead.

" _You've changed, Lewlyn. You've apologized to me, you've made things right, and I don't want you going through with this!_ "

"Rennie!" she snaps, reaching forward sharply, grabbing his hand, and he flinches, and for another split second, fear replaces itself in his eyes, back when she brought the blade down, back when she wanted him dead, back when she loved him and he didn't love her... back when he had been an Avox. Lewlyn blinks, seeing the terrified reaction, loosening up her tone. "I committed perjury by creating a false document that I had Calhoun sign, saying you committed treason, when that in itself is a crime," she runs a hand down her face. She's spent the last five years of her career with Bonnie and Pollux clamoring at her every second they get for the wrongdoings she's done, for the kids she's killed - _you aren't innocent, either, buttercup,_ Lewlyn thinks sardonically at Bonnie while holding a wine glass to her lips. and how there is no way she'll ever make amends, and that Rennie is twisted, crooked around her finger in a vice. "I physically am the one who cut your tongue off which has left you as a mute! I forced you into my service all because I was jealous of you, your good looks, and your talents! I have to pay for what I've done, and if that means sending myself up the river, that is what I am going to do, and that's final."

She enunciates it with a head bob, pushing back her chair which she had been sitting in, overlooking the terrace. Rennie goes to follow suit, perhaps to follow her back inside, but Lewlyn is tired. She wants a nap, she wants to lie down, wrap herself in her sheets, and never speak to another soul. No one is going to convince her to change her mind. In a month, she's throwing in the towel. All the fame. All the fortune. All the potential extravagant dinners, wearing velvet and diamonds every day of the week, to having room service, making an affluent salary... she's crossing the border into the shadow lands.

Lewlyn does not look back at Rennie, who is standing on the terrace, hand outstretched towards her, her name resting on his lips, and she exits her own apartment, fleeing to someplace better, somewhere else.

Anywhere than there.

* * *

 ** _Calhoun Rodney: President of Panem P.O.V_**

* * *

Bonnie's screams are a noise he has not heard very often in his life, that being the screams of pain, and he is unsure whether or not to be proud of himself for that achievement or not, for whether or not he has not heard, more than once or twice, the sound of his wife yelling at the top of her lungs in pain. He's holding onto her left hand as tightly as possible, in the largest hospital room the doctors and surgeons could give her without sending cancer patients to the basement, and the chanting of support from Lewlyn, Rennie, Pollux, Valencia, and Kevia all in the room, observing, but not interfering, makes for the odd symphony. The only occupant that would normally be there that isn't, as Calhoun does a quick go-over, is Hector, he watching Arizona's kids back in Ten, enjoying the spoils of a victor life, while Lance, Hale, and Arizona were taking the task of last minute touches on the playroom in the mansion.

"Just a few more pushes, Bonnie," coaches the doctor crouched low in front of his wife at the rear end.

"What do you think I'm doing?" his wife yells at the woman, through her pain, which has tears streaking down her cheeks.

"She's just trying to be helpful, sweetie," he admonishes her gently, pressing his free hand onto her shoulder.

"I just want our baby out of me!" Bonnie's yell reaches a fever pitch, and the onlooking crowd winces.

Calhoun is not against having them in the birthing room, as the hospital room is almost as large as their own living room back in the mansion, but none of the ladies present have given birth... and of course, none of the men. All they can offer is their emotional support. The last eight months have been something truly wonderful, for him at least, to see her belly swell, as the child comes closer and closer to the due date, that _their_ child is alive, and growing, and soon, oh so soon, he'll have them in his arms.

They do not know the gender, anytime Bonnie needed to have an ultrasound appointment, it had been to simply check on the baby's status, but the gender never to be revealed until the crowning moment - Calhoun could not help himself with the pun, which he knows is rather horrible, but he'll deal with it - which is high upon them. He has not had too much time in the other large moment in his life, that being ending the Hunger Games as Panem would know it, but he did not see how hard that could in essence, be, but he couldn't focus on that yet.

Bonnie screams in pain again, throwing her head back, and Lewlyn of all people makes a daring step forward to the other side of the bed, which is left unoccupied, gripping her other hand. "You can do this, Bonnie," she tells her.

"What do you think I'm trying to do?" his wife yells at the Head Gamemaker once again, red in the face, hot tears streaking down her cheeks. "Give up?" The months have been good for their relationship as well, Calhoun has noticed, observing from the distance, nose buried in books. The two women still have their spats, but the distinguishing difference is that the two can be in the same room together without it catching on fire. Calhoun observes, from his ledge, a shift in his Head Gamemaker, but he cannot put his finger on it, the thought returning again as he looks at her, the way she almost doesn't look at him, as if she has something to hide, but that it is interrupted when Lewlyn places a hand against Bonnie's face, something he's never seen her do. He's the only one in recent years that has ever placed his hand against her face.

"You are the strongest woman I have ever met, Bonnie."

His wife inhales, exhales, chest rising, the doctor continuing to coach her, and Calhoun squeezes her hand, while the onlookers all cheer and clap and turn away, as Rennie's face has gone white, which causes Pollux to laugh. Bonnie furrows her eyebrows together, panting. "Lewlyn, thank you, but that is not what I need right now, okay? Thanks, but no thanks..." and as she finishes her statement, it rises up in an ear-piercing shriek, and the doctor smiling.

"I can see the crown," the doctor announces, and the cheering gets louder and louder.

Calhoun cannot help but feel that this is all bizarre, as if the Hunger Games has teleported into this hospital room instead. Did his mother have a hard time birthing him, a woman no longer alive? A grave he never visits? He crouches low next to his wife, kissing her against the temple. "I love you," he whispers. He feels useless; Calhoun hates uselessness, and he is not going to be able to contribute to the war effort of his wife passing this baby simply by standing there. "I love you so much."

Bonnie yells again, and the baby comes free, crown showing through, and when the doctor comes back up to a standing position, there's a newborn in his arms. His wife's face changes immediately from the awful screaming, to pleasantry, and the entire mood of the hospital room lifts, like Atlas being relieved of carrying the world on his shoulders, the thunderstorm clouds dissipating into haze. "Oh, it's over..." she exhales, with a sigh of relief, falling back onto her pillow, sweat pouring down her forehead, tears dripping down her cheeks.

Lewlyn gasps, holding a hand to her mouth. "Oh, how beautiful..."

The president leans closer to Bonnie, wrapping one arm around her protectively, trying to not put on too much pressure. "You did it, Bonnie. That's our baby..." he feels the tears prickling at his eyes, and he is not a man to cry very often. He can count on one hand the amount of times he's cried in his life from something that hadn't been pain. Marrying Bonnie and kissing her at the alter is one, the hours after realizing his wife is pregnant, burying his mother into the ground, and he'll chalk the birthing of their child onto the list as well.

"Well, doctor?" Pollux asks, and the other four gathered in the room surround the bed, Calhoun's chest restricting tightly. This is too many people in the room, but he doesn't want to kick any of them out. None of them even had to show up or be here for any of this, and the fact that they have showed up speaks volumes.

The doctor finishes checking the genitalia of the baby, and then, with a wide smile, "It's a girl, Mr. and Madam President," and she hands the newborn over to Bonnie.

Calhoun gasps, while Bonnie makes a cooing noise in her throat, as he looks down at their newborn, his _baby girl,_ with her face bright red, she squalling, squirming slightly in his wife's grasp. Tiny, tiny as can be, Calhoun notices, not the largest child in the world, and certainly not the tallest. The doctor asks Lewlyn to step aside for a second, cotton swab in hand, and the baby cries out in pain, anger, sadness... Calhoun isn't sure, but the doctor presses the cotton swab against the baby's cheek for a few seconds. When that is finished, she walks over to a large center console in the far right of the hospital room, cotton swab in hand, placing it inside a drawer, shutting it.

"She's ours, Bonnie," he whispers to her.

"Hello, sweetie," she coos at their child, gently rubbing her pointer finger down the baby's cheek. Her eyes are still squeezed shut, but gorgeous all the same. He has never seen his wife this happy in ages, in _months._

Valencia and Kevia share a glance, and the newest victor on the block is crying as well, she wiping tears away. "I needed this today," she says, and Kevia squeezes her wrist.

Rennie manages to move closer towards his sister, and signs something at her. It hadn't been something most of them caught onto yet, the Panemian Sign Language, as Calhoun has a copy of his own, but whenever he looks at him, at his auburn hair, and those green eyes that look damaged beyond repair, a twinge of guilt races through him. Lewlyn nods her head, an effervescent smile plastered on her face. "Rennie says congratulations, Calhoun, Bonnie,"

They're too distracted to notice, Calhoun running his hands through the few wisps of bright beach blonde hair that rest on their forehead. Their little girl finally opens her eyes, those liquid blue, the teal that every newborn in Panem has at one time or other, and how gorgeous she was.

The doctor, now sitting down at the console, turns around in her chair. "Have you two decided on a name?"

Lewlyn and Rennie part ways so Bonnie and Calhoun have the perfect shot towards their doctor, occasionally their little girl making noises. A name. _Her name._ Perhaps one of the biggest decisions in their life as parents, and maybe even perhaps _the_ biggest, in some aspect. He looks at her, and she looks at him, and for the first time in a rather long time - Calhoun tries to not focus on the specifics, which don't truthfully matter - they've come to an agreement.

"Are you sure about this?" he asks her.

"More than anything," Bonnie says.

He nods his head, closing his eyes, a faint smile dancing on his lips. This is for the best. "No name for her," and he squeezes Bonnie's shoulder. "When the time comes, our child will pick her own name and it'll be what she wants."

"What she wants?" Kevia echoes, and Bonnie's eyes flash straight at her. "What if she decides, at two years old, to name herself Broom?"

"Then we have a daughter named Broom," his wife says to her, a bit icily, and the mood in the room drops a bit, _just a bit._

The doctor types something else on the keyboard. "I'll simply but N/A for now. Is that okay, Mr. President?" she asks him, turning around briefly, to which he nods, and she resumes her searching. The cotton swab had a bit of their daughter's newly formed saliva on it, a bit of her DNA, and inputting it into the console, it helps give the doctors a look on what the baby would be like in the future, any signs of medical problems, their height, weight, eye color, hair color... on and on and on it would go. She types something on her keyboard, leaning into the screen. "So, your little girl is seven pounds, six ounces. Her projected adult height looks to be 5'5, which is taller than you, Madam President," she regards to Bonnie. "She has a combination of one dominant gene and one recessive gene for ginger hair, and will have your eyes, Mr. President. No signs of heart trouble in the future, perhaps a case of waning eyesight in her mid-twenties, but she'll be a healthy girl," she turns back around towards them.

"Welcome to the world, sweetheart," Bonnie greets their daughter, and there is a look in their child's eyes, a look Calhoun cannot place, but the stare is directed at him, as if _he_ is foreign, as if _he_ doesn't belong, while everyone else is meant to be there.

"We should give them space, guys," Lewlyn says, and the other clamor up in agreement, Valencia wiggling her fingers at the baby, Pollux conversing with Kevia on her eyelashes - "They're the same, Polly," she calls him, at which he makes a face - and then the Head Gamemaker, with her brother exit out the hospital room into the lobby, leaving he and her with the doctor and their baby.

Calhoun rubs Bonnie's shoulder, heart flaring in his chest, another kiss on the forehead. Nothing else matters in this moment and time, just he, and his wife.

So why is it he still feels like there is something wrong, as he stares at his daughter?

What lies have been told for this baby to be born?

Would she be disgusted with having parents who once officiated the mass murder of teenagers, which one day she herself will be?

He shakes his head, keeping the smile on his face, and kisses his newborn's forehead.

"We're going to be just fine, sweetheart," he tells her, as the doctor makes her way back over to the bed. "You, me, and mommy, one big and happy family."

Bonnie nods her confirmation, and the three embrace in their own way, holding the newborn tight to themselves.

* * *

 ** _Master of Ceremonies Pollux Aetos P.O.V_**

* * *

There's a moment in everyone's life, Pollux is petty sure about this, when others are dragged at the end of their rope, where they can no longer hold their tongue, and suffice to say, he's reached the end of that rope. It has been three weeks since Bonnie gave birth to their newborn, a child they still have not named and will leave up to her when she's ready - "And what if she's never ready?" he asks the question, to which her stare gives him a frozen spine - and that is that on the matter. In a week's time, the 101st Hunger Games were to begin, and there had been a victory tour for Valencia, there had been showers and champagne gifts, and the victor crying, all the while Pollux talks over it all, just a few months ago.

No accusations, no inflammatory propaganda, and best of all, no hatred, but it still means Valencia Shale is incapable of keeping it together, and has a meltdown on stage in District 2, when staring at Milor Drusus and Persephone Castor's faces on the projected screens, and the girl collapses. Pollux doesn't truthfully harbor hatred for the kid, or at least, he hasn't tried to, but it has become so difficult in his later years. The way she sniffs at him with disdain, as if she hadn't been the one to murder people in an arena. Disdain. _Pah._

However, this morning has him stumbling into Bonnie's office, still there, won't be going away. He has heard grumblings of there being the end of the Hunger Games, which sounds nigh near impossible, as they're to literally start _in a week's time._ How do you cancel something that is supposed to be in perpetuity? He's not sure, and he's not about to hop over to that existentialist type of thinking just yet. He hadn't spoken to or had a single conversation with Rennie since the day he talked to him in this same hallway, to drop the stats of the prior year, which only lasted nine days, where sometimes the tributes are in the arena for a much longer, _much longer_ time. And he is to preside over it all.

He doesn't want to bring this to Calhoun, as he knows Calhoun will refuse, for the two of them having such a shared history together, but instead he'll bring it to Bonnie, now fully recovered from her giving birth, their little baby spending half her time in a sanctioned sanctuary by several nurses, or in her loving parents' arms, and he's never seen Bonnie and Calhoun so close to one another, not even after their wedding night or the honeymoon, or _any of it._ It's this child. Bonnie will accept his walking away from it all. Especially if the Games were to end, he might as well try and jump ship before it all burns down.

Bonnie is on the phone when he approaches, her door open, he crossing the threshold and knocking. She looks up at him, eyebrow raised, but then holds up a finger, phone pressed to her ear as she turns back and forth in her office chair. "Uh-huh, I understand. No, I hear you Augustus, blue is an unflattering color on me," there's a sharp edge to her voice, which causes Pollux to frown; she's speaking with the outfit designator - he prefers the word coordinator himself - for all of the Rodney administration personnel. Pollux refuses his help, as he knows how to dress himself without needing some other person to do it for him. "Well, I'm sorry beautiful, but I have someone else on the line to speak with. Yes, I'll see you for dinner tomorrow night. Uh-huh. Alrighty... bye, bye," she says, hanging up the phone, taking a sip of water from the glass resting near the phone. "Hi, Pollux, what do you want?"

Rather brisk of her, Pollux notes, but he disregards it. He's not here to trade petty insults.

"I want out," he says to her, rather cryptically, which has Bonnie raise an eyebrow at him.

"What do you mean?" she asks.

"I want out," Pollux repeats himself, crossing his arms. "Out of the whole shebang. I don't want to be the Master of Ceremonies anymore, give it to someone else."

"You're quitting?" Bonnie has a pen in her hand, constantly clicking the pen cap up and down, creating a fast rhythm with it, over and over again. She swivels some in her chair, mocking him.

"Call it retirement."

"You're in your mid-forties," she blinks at him, unemotional.

"I have gray hairs!" he protests. "Besides, I've been hearing about the end of the Games lately, and so I am not staying around to become some television persona to the Capitol or the districts just to watch," he keeps his arms crossed. "I want out."

Bonnie raises both eyebrows as the statement 'end of the Games' comes tumbling out of his lips, but she doesn't register any other spouts of emotion to that, instead placing her elbows on the desk, crossing her arms over. "Well, Pollux, I don't have any power over that. You have to speak to Calhoun about that."

"Well, I don't want to talk to him, I-" he starts.

"Sometimes you have to do stuff you don't want to do, Pollux!" she snaps at him, getting to her feet at an alarming speed. "You think I like sitting here, creating deadly monsters to rip out children's throats?" Bonnie leans across the desk. "That butterfly I created ripped out the throat of that boy from Five, Edwin Bishop, someone I knew personally, actually, Pollux. I was crying about that, on my couch, or do you not remember that?"

"I remember that..." the interviewer whispers.

"It isn't the best job, I'll admit, presiding over the deaths of teenagers, now that I have my own, but I do it because Calhoun put me there. I stay here for the good of the country, how the Hunger Games keep us in line, keep the Districts remembering..." she sits back down angrily in her chair, which moves way some as she lands. "Sometimes I'd like to just be a normal housewife to my husband, but this gives me political power. I don't like it, Pollux," she tells him.

He bites on his lower lip. " _You don't like it, that's correct,"_ he tells himself. " _You love it, it is everything you are_." Pollux inhales deeply, shoulders rising and falling, as he teeters back and forth on his heels. "I'm sorry, Bonnie, but I can't be a part of any of this anymore. Not of your schemes, not of the Games... none of it. I resign," and with that, finished with what he had to say, Pollux marches himself out of her door.

She stands up behind him, clear her tactics didn't work, and there's fury on her face, but he doesn't care. "You can't walk away, Pollux! It'll always follow you!"

He hears her, but he doesn't listen to her; he'll never listen to another snake like Bonnie Rodney ever again. Unfortunately, he cannot stop her, cannot give warning to any others... he'll simply be a bystander forever.

Pollux hates it, but there are tears flowing down his cheeks as he walks back into the broad daylight of the Capitol.

Tears he does not wipe away.

He is in mourning.

* * *

 ** _Arizona Merviere: Victor of the 88th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

Finally.

That is the word that comes to his mind, to Arizona's, as the grand mess is over. A week to himself and Hale, for the two of them to have complete security and privacy back home in District 10; he misses his children, who he has seen a time or two over the course of the last eight months, but Hale has not been able to see Arianne and Elias at all, and she misses them terribly, with their tanned faces, dark hair, dimples and freckles and pimples, and his wife will not stop talking about them, and how much she wants to be near them.

He hasn't spoken to Hector all that much since the day he left back home. The occasional message, of course, such as his older brother reminding him not to step on any toes without being careful of whose toes they were. " _Aren't I always careful about my surroundings?"_ he asks his brother, which of course, naturally has him running into the wine cooler display as he is not looking at to where he's going.

However, before he and Hale can take the train back to District 2, which they'll then also depart together on a train to District 10, since Two is closer, there is one final gauntlet he must go through, and that is how President Calhoun always says goodbye to them before they leave, as time has it again and again they're the last two victors to stay in the Capitol. It is easier, in some regards, to escape the president's odd sense of justice and tradition of victors from different districts comingling, than being at home, needing coverups for nearly every person they run into, people who'd send them up the river without a second thought. He has nothing to worry about, and Arizona knows that it is everyone else around him that is so high strung that has made this difficult, but he doesn't care.

The sun is starting to set, as the three of them - he, Hale, and Calhoun - stand in the pretty empty train terminal, as they are the last shuttles for the night, until the sun will rise again and there will be a new schedule. The sky is a gorgeous alternating blanket of hazy sunbursts, vivid amaranthines, stunning carnation pinks, and Arizona breathes it all in, where the sky is _almost_ as beautiful as the woman he is happily married to.

"I wanted to say thank you, again, for both of you," Calhoun tells the two of them, as a train blows through the station, wind whistling in the tunnel, causing their hair to blow everywhere. "You guys, and Lance and Kevia have really helped Bonnie and I this year, as the Games ended, and over the break and all."

"And Hector," Arizona reminds him.

"And Hector, of course," the president says, looking down at his feet, black dress shoes that are certainly going to get dirty from the ground, which looks like it needs a power wash.

"We just want to be useful, is all," Hale smiles, her hair long and curly, bobbing against her shoulders, she dressed rather up in a shawl, despite it being hot and humid in the early weeks of August, a whole year since the madness began, where Valencia Shale comes running home as victor. Arizona cannot help but smirk at her, as his wife tugs up on the shawl a bit higher on her neck, covering up the hickey that sits in the dead center. Those gusts of wind could become her mortal enemy if she isn't careful, he's pretty sure.

"You are, I promise," he smiles back, and Arizona is happy seeing the change in their fearless leader. He has seen the haggard gray lines that create etches across his face, sorrow fields that burrow in his forehead when he raises his eyebrows. How the light in his eyes haven't died all the way, they've been reinvigorated... all because of that child. Arizona knows, deep in the back of his mind, that without Elias and his bucktoothed grin, or Arianne who doesn't know how to say 'specifically', he and Hale might not have been as happy as a couple as they once were.

It sinks in his brain then, at the naturalness of Calhoun's smile, at how pleasant the man has always been. He's a good man, a genuinely _good man._

" _Who presides over the killing of my children one day, is all,_ " comes a secondary thought in the back of his mind, but he ignores it.

"Well, in one week, I expect you guys back to mentor, right?" Calhoun asks, and there's a strange flicker of emotion that Arizona cannot exactly lay on a finger on as to what it is.

"Of course," and Hale has to swallow that statement. "Will Valencia be taking Kevia's place?"

"She will," the president nods his head, and Hale's features visibly relax. Arizona hasn't spoken a word to the blonde haired bitch from District 1, willing to sell her friends up a river, friends he thought were actually considered _family._

" _Screw everyone who isn't us,_ " he tells Hale one evening, the two in bed, sheets wrapped up to their chest, and he brushes a lock of hair out of her eyes, smiling pleasantly, pressing his lips on her forehead. " _Screw everyone who'd tear us apart, each and every last one of them..._ "

Calhoun steps forward, placing his hands on both of their shoulders, which has Hale jolt slightly, and Arizona has to frown despite trying to help himself, as there are tears in the man's eyes, real tears, and Arizona knows that their fearless leader does not cry. He never cries. "There's going to be change, Hale... Arizona, I'm going to instill change in Panem for everyone. For my daughter. For your kids," he nods at Arizona, and Hale blanches, she biting on her tongue. As far as Arizona is aware, there's not a single person that holds a position in the Capitol who knows who Elias and Arianne's mother truly is, instead of the woman back home who makes him want to vomit sometimes, but he cares about her enough too. "I promise it. I swear it. Just- just trust me, okay?"

"We trust you, Calhoun," Hale nods, pressing one hand on Calhoun's.

" _Except with the identity of my children's mother,"_ Arizona thinks to himself, but he presses a hand likewise on Calhoun's too, smiling. "We couldn't ask for a better president, Calhoun."

The man sniffles, wiping at his eyes, moving back away from the two of them, and the light in his eyes has dimmed somewhat, and the sky begins to darken, those carnation pinks and those sunburst oranges bleeding into the black expanse of the sky, like a towel soaking up water. "I'm sorry, I- I don't know what came over me," Calhoun shakes his head. "Regardless, have a safe trip you two. Thank you, once again."

"Anytime, Mr. President," the male victor nods.

Calhoun stands straight up, setting his shoulders back. Always someone in tiptop shape, in presentable form, and he is very, _very_ good. Arizona watches as the president of Panem, someone he should hate, but cannot find himself _to_ hate vanishes behind a stone column, dark suit and pants disappearing into the night sky, back to the mansion, back to his daughter, back to his wife, and he - Arizona - can finally turn to his wife.

He locks eyes with Hale, waiting a few moments, as there is no one who will be able to see them, and this platform has zero cameras, as they've made midnight kisses to one another before from this particular station, and the two step closer to one another, lips touching, electricity zapping up his synapses, but it is a quick peck on the lips, nothing deeply romantic, as he is not going to risk _too_ much of a chance.

"I love you," he exhales, resting his forehead against hers.

"I love you too, Ari," she says back to him.

The sound of their District 2 train can be heard pulling into the station, the bright halcyon beams of the lights at the front lighting up the whole platform, and like a chariot of heaven, doused in ichor and golden light pulls into the station at an alarming speed, coming to a stop gradually, one last trip of the evening, back to District 2.

Arizona holds Hale's hand, and she smiles at her husband, and he smiles at her wife. "Let's go home," he says.

The two board the train, the door closes behind them, and not even a minute later, it zooms off into the Panem night, shrouded in darkness, leaving the city of shattered glass and spilt blood behind.

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #48: Promises of a Liar. Which liar made a promise, you ask? That is up to you all to decide. This is what I will call the bridging chapter, where everyone - minus Valencia actually, and Hector I suppose - has been placed where they need to be as we reach the penultimate peril of the Capitol storyline, where I have said no one will be safe, and where I still do not think any of you are or will be prepared for what I am to unleash. I will suggest, if you have the time, to try and skim - or read, if you wish for the preference - over the Capitol chapters, because every little nuance, every character decision... it will culminate next chapter, as we've passed through the eye of the storm where the winds are the sharpest.**

 **In other news, concerning this chapter, Lewlyn and Rennie seem to have a relationship, my first time ever writing something that deals with incest, and it is an odd one, I'll admit, and our Head Gamemaker is hellbent on paying for her sins. Bonnie finally had her baby! I wanted this to be something that happened, since I do not often - or _ever,_ actually, I think - had a character of mine get pregnant and give birth in a story, and now Calhoun and Bonnie had a daughter, where I could juxtapose some of the darkness, drama and conflict, with a lighthearted moment of happiness, from both our leading Presidential pairing, and our victor pairing. Pollux has walked away from something or other, which, if you are confused, don't worry, it will all mean something... and our two victors Hale Cornerstone and Arizona Merviere have made their way back home, relationship till intact, their secret still kept.**

 **Next chapter, ladies and gentlemen, which I suspect is a spoiler in of itself, is called #49: Bonnie's Revolution, but before you drag out the pitchforks and torches and scream murder, think about the word 'Revolution' very carefully, and think what it might mean... and of course, I'll love plot predictions of what will go down, as #50 is our epilogue and will be the end of this massive story. Please review! It'll mean the world to me, and expect an update for this sometime later in the week. My starting semester of my junior year at FSU - Florida State University in Tallahassee, FL - is underway next week, so I am trying to write as much as I can and get it posted then too. I love you all so much! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	49. Bonnie's Revolution (Epilogue III)

**Hey guys, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Sheep Led to Slaughter, Chapter #49: Bonnie's Revolution, where everyone** ** _everywhere_** **should be afraid. Everything in the Capitol OC character storyline has been for this moment, but I will be frank, there are some characters you will not see in this chapter that will be in the finale chapter, #50, but obviously I won't say who due to spoilers of course. If you have been reading along, I think those that have will see the connections, the drama, and it all comes to a head. Last chapter, the biggest moment, was Bonnie gave birth to a little girl that she and Calhoun have decided to not name, and that we've reached the end of the line. This chapter takes place all in one evening, one event after the other, and you better buckle yourself in. Hope you enjoy Chapter #49: Bonnie's Revolution.**

* * *

 ** _Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis P.O.V_**

* * *

A gentle three weeks have gone in passing, and Lewlyn stands contently on her balcony, dressed down in a bathrobe, hair knotted and long across her back, she shivering at the coolness of the outside air. It is late, just after midnight, the moon at its zenith in the sky, hanging directly above her apartment. A sign from the gods, or something, but she isn't sure. Lewlyn looks back at her apartment, at the wooden and tiled floors in a mismatch, like chess squares, with the delightful arbor wood couch, adorned with pillows that smell of holly and ginger. The lanterns, not lightbulbs, that dangle from the ceiling, surrounded in tiny wicker baskets that create their own sort of enclosed space for the light.

She'll miss this. In one week's time will be the end of her opulence, the end of the martini glasses that when she swivels the drink, the outer rim shines like glistened, freshly packaged sugar. How her bathtub can interact like a jacuzzi if she twists a certain knob on the fifteen button console _just right,_ where the jets hit her back with the force of a Mach truck, and the water smells like lavender with honey bubbles that froth about from the suds. Most of all, she's sure, is that she'll miss her brother. He hasn't taken the news well still, at least once a day arguing with her on the fact she shouldn't send herself to prison, to Calhoun's executioner block.

"A small price we have to pay for our sins," she repeats to herself, the same exact phrase she uses today to end her conversation with Rennie earlier that morning in the main center of the Gamemaker Center, with the haloed disk showcasing the next arena to never be. Her brother frowns at her, and she has been incapable of driving the point in that he will survive without her, and that she can survive without him... but nothing is sinking it yet, and she's about to go crazy. Lewlyn wants to grab her brother by the shoulders, shake him around and around and around and see if the shaking rattles his brain enough, but currently, nothing.

They haven't talked much since then, with the occasional nod at one another while they're working. It is the strangest thing for Lewlyn, she realizes as the train has been moving forward, the train of life with tracks that lead nowhere, about having to work and 'build' and 'maintain' something when in one week it is all going to be cancelled and for naught. She has somewhat of a normal life, making sure Valencia's victory tour runs smoothly, but after the new victor has her ball in the Capitol, her entire schedule is thrown upside down and for a loop, and so is she.

Calhoun still hasn't told Bonnie that he is ending the Hunger Games, never extending the conversation past her, Hector, and her brother, and that it hadn't been up to any of them to broach the subject. Lewlyn watches her arch-nemesis - she has no idea if the olive branch petition she sent actually worked, but they do seem to get along fine, up until she is around seven months pregnant and Calhoun cuts her off from working on mutts and stuff for the arena, as he needs her to lay down at home on fluffy pillows and wrap herself up in blankets.

 _"You're domesticating me?" Bonnie yells at her husband, giving him a slight push, in which that slight push almost sends him over the edge of the second level of the Gamemaker Center, in which Lewlyn is not planning on catching him if he does fall._

 _"Your baby is domesticating you, not me," he corrects her, and then with a frown, "Also, not the word I'd use for it."_

Despite things being clearer with Bonnie, the moment she leaves, the remainder of her days while working in the Gamemaker Center, planning for the 101st Hunger Games that will never come, are lighter, as if there's a tension released from her shoulders which evaporates like a phantom's kiss into the ceiling. She doesn't know how she'll take the news from her husband the evening before, and it may all prove disastrous, but it will be happening. It is all worked out, and Lewlyn is confident in the plan.

On the morning of the reaping, Calhoun will do a live broadcast from the mansion in front of everyone in Panem, who will have to find a way to watch this broadcast, as he'll only make it once. Naturally, everyone everywhere in the districts will be suspicious, as Lewlyn has seen her fair share of the bad going worse, and of the districts arising a few times in mass hysteria, but that had been to end the Hunger Games. Would they believe it if someone else wrote it out of existence?

He'll announce it, that the reaping for the 101st Hunger Games has been cancelled. That the reaping for the 102nd Hunger Games has been cancelled, and he'll eventually go on to say that the Hunger Games indefinitely, will be cancelled, now and forevermore, as decreed by a law he will hold in his hand, a law Lewlyn has signed, a law he's forged Bonnie's signature on - Lewlyn pales when he grabs the pen and does this, as Rennie is in the room, but she doesn't see her brother's face go white like she expects, he's simply normal, and himself, which she is unsure how to read - and that Calhoun has signed himself. All Peacekeeper send-outs will be arrested and executed should they attempt to force anyone into their respective Squares to be lined up and penned like cattle.

" _Executed?" Lewlyn finds herself wrinkling her nose in disgust._ " _Not put on trial for anything? Not charged with anything like-_ "

" _They're charged with treason, Lewlyn," Calhoun tells her, point blank. "I'm not an evil man, but I am just, and if anyone big or small out there wants those games to go on as planned, I'll have a stockade and a firing squad waiting for them," his face is impasse and serious, Lewlyn gulping._

 _Rennie types something on his tablet, and shows it to the group. "What about Bonnie?"_

 _Hector raises an eyebrow at the ex-Avox. "Are you asking Calhoun if he'd execute his wife should she try and stand in the way?"_

 _The redhead shrugs. "It needs to be asked."_

Calhoun never gave them an answer, Lewlyn realizes, after her brother asks that question. She's not even sure herself if he would murder his own wife, who just had their daughter, should she somehow try to interfere. " _She doesn't have any power, though,"_ Lewlyn tells herself, in a soothing manner, placing a hand flat against her sternum, a self-made gesture for comfort. " _She couldn't get Peacekeepers to even build a water fountain in her name..._ "

She turns from her balcony, closing the sliding glass door behind her, stepping back inside to her apartment. Someone else in the administration had been sitting on her mind the last couple weeks, and when she turns back around to face outwards towards the Capitol skyline, she catches her reflection, but she catches _his_ reflection too. Her brother, and that smug Pollux Aetos, pressed up in the latter's apartment, their breath hot on the glass, as the whites of their mutual sex drives paint the glass, and the way their flesh buckles into one another.

A slight burn forms in her throat, which she dissipates by forming a fist. He got to do that to her brother, and she remembers that night very clear, as she and Calhoun discuss the Quell twist on his one of many balconies, and when he mentions her brother's name, every questionable thought floods back to her, of how he enabled her brother's mutilation without a second thought, when she and him never got along and never looked eye-to-eye... and how that led her lamb-like little brother into the jaws of the leviathan known as the Master of Ceremonies to the rest of Panem.

He has been the wildcard, in all of this, as he has not been included in the proceedings, but the phone call she made with Hector Merviere eight months ago is very fresh, as Rennie bursts into her apartment, sweating, a panicked expression on his face, holding out the piece of paper that had been crumpled in his hands, with the writing '' _End the Hunger Games?'_ plastered over it in pencil. Her heart swells in her chest, she grabs her desk phone for Hector, as Rennie runs all the way to the presidential mansion to speak to Calhoun.

She approaches him several weeks later, Pollux, at his apartment, which still has the shards of glass underneath his couch from the table he breaks in his rage when she required the two break up, from the bruises that Rennie said came from him, a moment that has still gone untested. She tries her hardest to not leer at him when he opens the door, inviting herself in, standing still in the center of his living room.

" _I came here to ask you something," she rocks on her heels. "I promise, you aren't in trouble. You're not getting fired, I swear it."_

 _"What is it?" Pollux dries out his hair with a towel. He has always just gotten out of the shower with her, it seems._

 _"Did you hear anything about the Hunger Games ending?" His face goes as white as a sheet._

She can still feel the sighs of relief sinking into her heels, as Pollux babbles for the next few minutes of hearing it as a rumor, and had just been about to head to Calhoun's office to speak with him on the matter, in which Lewlyn covers and says that it had already been disclosed, that it had been just a rumor that Calhoun had been looking into. That seems to alleviate the situation, she's pretty sure, from how Pollux visibly relaxes too, and her heartbeat returns to a normal pace in her chest.

Over the last few days, however, Lewlyn has seen Pollux change inside, someone casting shady glances at all who get near him, and that he hasn't shown up to the stage to speak in four different shifts, and that, somehow, he's retired. She has no idea what is happening inside his head, but she's not going to try and psychoanalyze him, as she tries to psychoanalyze herself.

Lewlyn walks over to her computer, bringing up the messenger service. She pulls up Rennie's page, their last message sent last night about the functionality of using a fork or a spoon to eat soup - she's pretty sure her brother just asks random questions like that to know he's communicating with her - and she has never felt a more awkward question be asked in her life. She leans over her desk, typing a comment to the screen.

" _I left the door unlocked and am going to take a bath. I want you to come over, no need to bring your key,_ " and she hits send.

Immediately, as if her brother has nothing better to do, responds. " _Sure thing, Lewlyn. I'll bring my violin and be right over._ "

She smiles to herself, righting from the desk. The one positive thing about all the killing of children and the deaths of the tributes, and the coming round of her prison sentencing that she'll self-administer is that she has fixed her relationship with Rennie, with the soft kisses to her collarbone while she caresses his hair, placing her fingers deftly at his hips, curving them slightly so he sighs upwards at the ceiling.

Lewlyn enters her bathroom, turning on the hot water for the tub. She undoes the knot of her bathrobe, letting it fall to the floor, exposing her naked body to the mirror laid out in front of her. All saggy in the wrong places, she thinks dismally to herself, placing a hand underneath one of her breasts. She had never been a girl with a full bust, never one with the largest form, which brought bullying from the circles Bonnie had been involved in, but ironically never Bonnie herself, where it seemed the viciousness and vileness came from her later years, to the point where Lewlyn could not stand being in the same room as the blonde witch.

Somehow, _somehow_ her brother wants this, wants to drink in all of her nakedness that she sees, when she wouldn't want herself had she been him. How he's blessed with all the right gifts, and she's cursed with all the others, nightmarish little presents wrapped in gift wrapping paper that is barbed wire, hot to the touch.

The Head Gamemaker shakes her up, getting into the tub. The hot water prickles at her skin slightly, but a warmth she is used to, the water rising and rising ever still as she dips beneath the water. She extends herself full out along the tub's surface, placing her head on the cool end of the tub, her back to the front door, the perfect angle as she cannot see her mirror or see the outside unless she turns her head and faces the doorway, as she has greeted people from her bathtub before, entirely unprofessional, she knows.

Grabbing one bottle of suds near her, resting on the edge of the tub, she uncaps it, pouring a golden liquid into it. The water turns into liquid sunlight whenever the contents of the bottle hit it, the aroma of honey wafting to her nose, and Lewlyn sighs, closing her eyes, sinking in beneath the warmth. The water has reached up to her breasts, covering what she'd consider the least desired part of her body, as to how she's been single her entire life, how she's become childless, not blessed with Bonnie's stunning good looks and wicked charm and politicizing skills that have led to nowhere, snagging the president of their great nation.

She's always wanted Calhoun, slightly, but that is what every woman in the Capitol wanted, while most men, save a few who wanted him too, wanted to _be_ him. Jealousy runs its own currents as well.

The sound of the door to her apartment opens and slams shut, and a smile dances across her lips.

"Hello, Rennie! I'm here in the tub if you want to come over. Place your violin over on the table."

Something heavy clunks onto the table that is by her front door, sounding a bit more metallic than made of wood, but he's made several alterations to it since she gifted him the violin. Footsteps make their way over to her, and Lewlyn sits up slightly in the tub, keeping her eyes closed, as the footsteps stop to just behind her, the crunching of someone's pants as they kneel down behind her.

A hand, a rather cold hand at that, unlike the tile she rests her neck against, presses soothingly into her shoulder, caressing and digging into the flesh.

She cannot help the slight exhalation of breath as the fingers dig naturally into her shoulder blade. "Oh, I've been meaning to get one of these, Rennie. Maybe you should be a masseuse!" Lewlyn is incapable of gauging his response.

He shifts closer, and Lewlyn freezes, but she keeps her eyes closed, as such to not cause alarm. She feels something brush her shoulders, something light, something she most certainly knows... and it isn't someone's hands. It's hair. It's _long hair._

Rennie does not have long hair.

"Who is-" she starts, but the person that isn't her brother, that is in her apartment, that is giving her a massage, leans in and whispers in her ear.

"Oh, you wish I was your brother, don't you? You sick _fuck!_ " a voice that is definitely not Rennie screams in her ear.

Lewlyn tries sitting up, but a hand grabs her by the hair, pulling her back down onto the base of the tub. Stars explode in her eyes from the blunt impact, and her hands rise and fall laxly into the water. One second, there's the cold exposé of the air on her neck, and then there's the even colder bite of a knife running from one end to the other of her neck, the blade drawn back in a quick, ruby red smile.

She begins to convulse, and her hair is wrenched back further, forcing her gaze up into the vampiric eyes of Bonnie Rodney, the First Lady staring down at her, blade in hand, and Lewlyn tries to speak, blood pouring out of her mouth, streaming down her neck.

The water, the golden water, turns crimson as the river of life drains from her, her naked chest a battle between hot and cold as the cardinal droplets stain the basin of the tub, the air no longer filled with the aromas of milk and honey, but that of copper, blood, and lust.

Hate is in Bonnie's eyes as she brings the knife over to Lewlyn's hand, she watching all of this as she bleeds out into the tub, lifting her fingers up which have gone to die hanging outside the tub, wrapping the Head Gamemaker's fingers over the handle to the blade.

" _You conniving little bitch..._ " is Lewlyn's last thought, as her vision goes completely white.

The olive branch petition had broke.

* * *

 ** _President of Panem Calhoun Rodney P.O.V_**

* * *

No matter what he does, he cannot stop his heart from beating at the pace it is going. Everything is fine and well, for him, as he sleeps, clutching a few of the bedsheets to his chest, the sound of their daughter cooing softly from her crib which swings back and forth in the corner of the room rising to the walls. Bonnie is beside him, still awake, reading some paperback novel, and she presses a kiss between his shoulder blades, going to get a drink of water.

Somehow, that means chaos, as ten minutes later, several Peacekeepers burst into his room, screaming his name, scaring him half to death, snapping him awake. He's roused out of bed, taking the swinging crib with him, as he's brought into the living room away from all the windows and open doors leading to the outside, several Peacekeeper generals standing around, speaking into their headpieces, all while their daughter cries, he bent over, trying to soothe her. Bonnie hadn't returned from getting her glass of water, and she's nowhere in the mansion.

He's wrapped up in a night robe, hands stuffed in his pocket, standing in the center of the living room.

"Where's Bonnie?" he demands, at one of the generals near him. "Where's my wife? It's nearly one in the morning!"

The head of the Peacekeepers walks over to him, adorned by the silver suit of armor rather than the gleaming blizzard white, a man of firm character, with a cold cut jawline, piercing blue eyes that remind Calhoun of easier days, a Mr. Lazarus Pietro, of Russian descent with a hard accent. "She has not been found, Mr. President. Some citizen rang the emergency alarm over in the other half of Quadrant A," all the water in Calhoun's mouth dries up. Quadrant A is the administrative apartments, the city circle, and the presidential mansion, the other half contains all of the apartments for every Gamemaker, all the stylists, Pollux, Lewlyn... "Someone was murdered in their bathtub, but we still do not know who, and we are looking for a murderer."

He takes a step back in shock, gasping, but trying not to be too loud for the baby's sake. A lump forms in his throat. A murder? Who on Earth would-

"Someone's dead?" Calhoun realizes he isn't even breathing heavily, quick and shallow breaths that dissipate as quick as he inhales. He grips the side of the couch, needing to sit down.

"We're doing everything we can, sir," Lazarus has one hand on the holster of his pistol, the latch unhooked, and he could pull it out and fire off at any moment. There's noise in Lazarus's intercom, voices coming out of the earpiece, which he presses on and turns away from the president. "Yes? Uh-huh, alright," and he turns to Calhoun. "Mr. President, sir, I need to step out of the room for a moment and head to the incident. I will keep two guards posted in front of the door for you, sir."

"And- and Bonnie?" his mouth is dry as the deserts out in District 10.

"We'll do our best to find your wife as well, sir," and the Head Peacekeepers nods his head, stepping out of the room.

Calhoun holds his arms tight, hugging his sides, shivering. It is oddly cold in the mansion, for the evening, he notices. The air conditioning must be on full blast, a high whirring in the ceiling. He makes his way back over to their daughter, three weeks old at this point, where just a few days ago Bonnie is released from bedrest and is allowed to resume working again, working towards a Hunger Games that will never come true. He's trying to hold it together, trying to keep the bile down in his throat. Nothing ever extraordinary happens in the Capitol, he feels.

There's the fights and the drama, and the one time when Rennie's tongue is cut out of his throat, or the occasional time he must send a Peacekeeper to be branded as a traitor, but nothing on this pedigree, nothing like that, nothing at all. People do not just get murdered in the middle of the night, and unless there is something happening, _he_ knows about it.

His mind is racing, a constant whirl, wondering who it would be that is dead in their own bathtub... a _murder?_ Couldn't someone just hit their head and drown?

He perks his head up, after standing over his baby, trying to keep her asleep, keeping a hand resting on her crib that rocks back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, a metronomic motion, his eyes starting to droop as he looks at her. There's banter coming from the other side of the closed door to the living room, a woman's voice.

"I know what I look like! Let me in! I need to speak to my husband!"

The doors wrench open, and into the living room in steps Bonnie. Calhoun jumps to his feet, and the two Peacekeepers left to guard the door close it immediately.

"Bonnie!" he cries out to her, rushing over to her. However, he makes it two feet forward and then skids to a stop, socked feet making static electricity on the carpet. "Blood?" his voice rises into a whimper. "Whose blood is that, Bon?"

His wife is covered in blood, practically from head to toe, it stained all over her night robe, which had been fleece white, now a splotchy and bright crimson. The blood covers part of her neck, hands coated in it, some of it running up her arms, a few splatters on her face. She looks exhausted to him, but there isn't a look of fear in her eyes. "It- isn't-" she starts.

"Is it yours? Are- are you injured?" Calhoun does not know what to do with his hands, they rising and falling all along her body, until he decides to rest them on her shoulders.

She shakes her head, her blonde hair the only thing unscathed in terms of being covered in scarlet. "I'm fine, Calhoun, I swear."

"There's been a murder," his voice shakes. "Lazarus said someone in Quadrant A was murdered in their bathtub and-"

"Lewlyn," Bonnie interrupts him. "Lewlyn, Calhoun."

"What?" he furrows his eyebrows together.

"It was Lewlyn, honey. She's dead."

He falls back onto the floor, it shaking some, but still his daughter sleeps peacefully, soundlessly, while the metronome rocks back and forth. Bonnie looks away for a second, down at the floor, a lump in her throat. Did- did he just hear- did he just hear her correctly? Lewlyn Davis, the Head Gamemaker _dead?_ "No, Bonnie, you're not- you're wrong, she can't be, she-"

"She is," his wife says, and she shakes her head. "After I got my glass of water, I realized I wanted to speak to her about something before morning. Something about there being a rumor of the Hunger Games ending, and her being a part of it," Bonnie's gaze is directed off in the distance, but there doesn't seem to be a hint of sadness in her voice at this. "The door to her apartment was unlocked and I saw someone cut open her throat from ear to ear, Calhoun. I rushed forward to help her, but they knocked me down. By the time I got to my feet, they were gone, and she- she was gone too..."

Calhoun's heart stops, and his eyes match hers. Everything got quiet. The baby's crib stopped rocking, the sound of the Peacekeeper's light chatting behind the shut doors ceased to exist, but the sound of blood roaring in his ears is the loudest noise of them all, the water in his mouth drying up instantaneously. How- how would... he thought he put down the rumor, left it unguarded, he... _what?_

"What, Bonnie?"

"The end of the Hunger Games," she crosses her arms. "I found out that _you_ wanted to end the Hunger Games. You told Hector, you told Rennie, you told _fucking Lewlyn Davis!_ But you didn't tell me. You didn't tell your wife that you wanted to end the Hunger Games. The man who I have always known to be the man of tradition wanted to end the one that founded our nation, and you hid that from me..." She advances on him, and he backs up, in a different direction than into the baby's crib.

"Honey, I- I don't understand, I-" he starts saying, but she continues on speaking, and it seems as if the lights in the living room are starting to dim, as the air conditioner's whirring gets louder and louder and louder, rising to a fever pitch. His skin erupts in goosebumps, his face paling, his throat going dry. _She knows._ Has she always known?

"Hector told Lance, Lance told Kevia," Bonnie, covered in Lewlyn's blood, continues on walking forward, twirling a bright blonde strand around her fingers. "Kevia told me, because I was going to have her punished for stealing a necklace from our bedroom. You told Lewlyn, who told Rennie, which somehow led to Pollux, and Pollux inadvertently told me, confirming my suspicions."

"Bonnie, none of this makes any sense. I was just-"

"Just going to get us all killed!" she yells at him, and Calhoun backs up into the fireplace, his bare feet scuffing up against the metal gate, which pricks at his heels. All he can do is stare into his wife's gaze, where there used to be light, is now a pitch black cave. "Did you ever stop to think that the Hunger Games get the districts in line? That they had reason to fear us, to fear the Capitol? You take away what gives our country the infrastructure it needs to survive, you'll have us begging our knees, pleading at the sky. You take away the districts fear, and they no longer have any reason to fear us, to respect us. You'd have caused a revolution in the districts, where they would have come by the thousands and killed us, every last one of us."

He shakes his head, and the tears are about to well out of his eyes, about to spring forth. Calhoun has never wanted to cry harder in his life. "Bonnie, what are you talking about?"

"The Games, Calhoun, are what Panem needs to survive. Without them, we all collapse. They provide us with thousands of jobs for the Peacekeepers to make sure everyone in the districts are at the reaping. For the stylists to dress the tributes, the trainers for the horses, those who create our training systems... all of it is a machine!" she yells at him, and their daughter is awoken, she starting to cry. He wants to inch towards their child, but Bonnie isn't making an effort, her glare mustered directly at him. This is not how he expected to have break the news to her, which it clearly seems has been broken before he could do anything about it. "I know, I am not the largest fan of having teenagers kill each other, but I am willing to sacrifice twenty-three lives annually if it means we stay in power. If it means we can survive... you, me, and our child..." her face relaxes, somewhat, but the hostility is still there. The air has gotten thick, he choking on it with the tension. "Because you were given a child, you wanted to save the world. A child that isn't even-" his wife stops, cutting herself off, and she backs away from him for a minute.

At the moment, Lewlyn's proclaimed murder, if that is what Bonnie said is to be believed, comes to a halt, as Bonnie's words pass over his ears, and he steals a gaze at their daughter, who is now audibly distressed, crying in her crib.

"She isn't what, Bonnie?" he asks her, swallowing, trying to stand up straight, while his body is evidently shaking. "Our daughter isn't what?" She doesn't say anything, instead turning her head to the side. "Say it, Bonnie!" he yells at her, his voice reaching the highest he has ever shouted at her, perhaps at anyone in his entire life.

"She isn't yours!" his wife screams back at him, marching straight up to him, getting in his face.

He downs to one knee, the air taken out of his lungs as if someone had just sucker punched him in the gut. Calhoun coughs, clutching his chest, eyes bearing into the carpet. Bonnie looms over him, her head back in laughter, a noise that echoes around the room, a constant cry of laughter, and it rings in his head, a constant reminder, a _scream_ of her maliciousness. His heart is pounding in his chest, and he cannot believe his ears. Did- what _did she just say to him?_

"What?" he does not have the energy to look up at her.

His wife shakes her head out of pity. "You were so focused on your damn legacy that you didn't even pay attention, Calhoun. Didn't you listen to the doctor? Our daughter having your green eyes, and auburn hair? For someone to have red hair, which is two recessive genes, the mother and father both must have the DNA for red hair... which you don't have..." she cackles to herself. "I wasn't ever planning on telling you, but now, I suppose I must. Our daughter, for the last three weeks, has been staring you in the face, and you were so blind to see it. We haven't even touched each other like that in months!"

He gets to his feet, shakily, but any time he wants to look over at their daughter - she's not _his,_ he has to now remind himself, she's only Bonnie's child - while his throat is on fire. "If I'm not the father, who is?"

"Rennie."

"That's im- that's impossible..." he has forgotten how to speak, Calhoun has lost all words, and he wants to throw up onto the carpet.

"Our Head Gamemaker fucked him, she fucked her brother," Bonnie advances on him, backing up him against the bookshelf once more. "Our Master of Ceremonies fucked him. _I_ fucked him!"

"Bonnie, please, tell me you're-" he pleads at her one last time.

She shakes her head, hands shifting into her robe. "I loved you Calhoun, I really did, but now..." there are tears spilling down her cheeks. "You're just the means to an end."

His wife reaches into her robe, pulling something out, a silver gleam catching onto the chandelier lights, and all the water in Calhoun's mouth evaporates, his eyes widening. Bonnie holds onto the end of Peacekeeper's gun, a short and brunt pistol, the silver cap glistening underneath the halcyon halos above.

Calhoun thinks of a sunflower field, radiant fluorescent flowers bathing in a halcyon sunlight that warps into a sunburst sunset of warm cardinals and orange hazes. He's holding hands with his wife, and they're happy, content, and she's smiling. He's laughing, holding her tight as the child currently swings around between their shoulders. Gales of wind blow through and the trio looks so picturesque, but now the child is a blue and black blur of blonde hair and sharp, angry eyes that seem downright angry at everything and anything in the world. He's never seen her, he feels, not as a full woman. Perhaps the girl doesn't even exist.

The scene changes to earlier, and he remembers standing there, frozen in shell-shocked stupefaction at his wife's antics with are downright ludicrous. The watch vanishes over the cliffside, and so does a piece of he and Bonnie's marriage. He's always loved her, he will always love her, and even if his time is now, there's a heaven out there somewhere to look forward to with his wife. Her lips on his is a thought that nearly brings a smile to his face, but not here, and definitely not now is a time for such a peaceful and tranquil recollection of memories.

Her words are phantoms of candle wisps in the nape of his neck, consonants drenched in a warped and poisonous fire that leech at the skin. Bonnie's hands are brittle and stalwart glasses of jagged ice against his, coarse and painful as they rake down his back, drawing blood. He cries out, biting his tongue and lucid copper fills his mouth. He wants to believe in her, he wants to believe in her mission, and here he feels regret for so many years with lies that come full circle. He's denied her what she's wanted in secrecy, and the poor silverette is to be left in this world alone with the thought of never knowing her husband didn't believe in her.

He likes to think he's a good liar, he wants to believe it with the very full sanctity of his heart. But the emotions deny him such the pleasure, as Bonnie will sit over a tombstone, weeping into her hands that he is faithful and he is amazing, and he is dead and will never resurface and somehow it is all of her fault. Only if she hadn't wanted to never argue with him in the first place. Calhoun smiles at the thought, and he's downright upset he even let himself have that moment of emotion to shine through, he's too precarious and too caught off guard.

Calhoun wants this to be the last thought of his wife.

She pulls the trigger, shooting her husband dead in the heart.

He flies back up against the bookcase, their daughter - " _Not mine,_ " he whispers to himself, over and over again, " _Not mine..._ " - wailing, and as he slumps back, falling down, the light leaving his eyes, Bonnie wrenches forward in an ear-splitting scream, vaulting the gun away from her as far as she can, when the two Peacekeepers kept on guard burst through the living room doors, the child in her crib screaming her head off. Bonnie crumbles to her knees, hands brought to her face in an anguished gasp as she sobs, the Peacekeepers rushing forward.

It is Lazarus, the Head Peacekeeper at the helm, who reaches him first, but Calhoun feels a trail of blood slide out of his mouth, pooling down onto his shoulder, and the light vanishes from his eyes.

He's gone, and with it, the dream to end the Hunger Games dies too.

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: Victor of the 100th Hunger Games_**

* * *

Something's wrong.

She can feel it bristle over her skin, like electric bolts zapping at her every second they get. Something's... _off,_ and Valencia can feel it stirring in her stomach. She hugs her sides tight, freezing cold, as she's awoken randomly by a Peacekeeper at three in the morning in her bedside apartment, having occupied the first floor of the training center with Lance and Kevia, taking her old bedroom. Kevia is the only other person awoken with her, as the two make their way down the elevator onto the first floor, greeted by Bonnie in the lobby, who hugs onto both of them tightly when they reach her.

" _What's going on?"_ _she asks the First Lady, frowning._

 _"I don't have time to explain," Bonnie says, and her eyes are red, as if she's been heavily crying the last few hours._

 _"Where's Lance?"_

 _"I don't know, but I need you two to come with me, right now._ "

It is how Valencia finds herself standing alone, with Kevia and Bonnie, out on a train platform in the bullet train station, the central hub for all departures to the districts. The city sits behind them all, through the glass paned windows where the buildings are sat, stark and gone black. Usually, unless it had been much earlier in the evening, the lights are still on somewhere in the city, decorating the pathways in a nearly ghoulish white glow, with halcyon lanterns swinging from side to side. She has come to dislike everyone in the Capitol, Valencia comes to terms with, when she is sitting on a train that departed from District 1 back to the Capitol, where she is practically the only occupant on the entire vehicle, no Lance or Kevia to coach her on what to say, who to wave at, how to smile... all on her own.

She's supposed to be back to give an interview with Pollux on the Games, on her 100th year, for the interview that had never taken place, nearly nine and a half months now, where it all blurs together in her head. She's been at this for far too long now, and she wants to sit down. She doesn't want to smile into another camera ever again, but no one is allowing her to make that decision, as she's sat down in a chair too rock solid for it to be comfortable, clamps connecting her jaw to the chair so she sits still. It is the torture, Valencia realizes, what she had said around that stupid campfire to the rest of the Careers. Her strong and surly Milor, her darkling Marcus, the vivid and crazed Maisey, oh her Persephone that glittered in the moonlight... and Valencia feels faint at the thought of her old allies, all of which were now dead, rotting in the ground somewhere, immortalized forever in an archive no one would ever go flipping through, because why would anyone care?

Her worst nightmare, her biggest fear... a torture she couldn't run away from.

And wasn't this a torture?

There were several Peacekeepers guards with the three of them, but nothing had still been explain on Bonnie's behalf, causing Valencia's skin to prickle, as if someone had been trailing a feather down her back, sending shocks and synapses of worry through her spinal cord. Kevia is mostly silent, an odd look of guilt plastered on her old mentor's face. A mentor now turned friend, if that be the case, but it has Valencia confused without a doubt, has her blonde mentor has slinked into the shadows since her victory, seldom interacting with anyone, drinking by her lonesome, swirling around martini glasses and evil eyeing everyone else in the room.

She isn't dressed for the surprisingly cool weather, somewhere in the low sixties, despite it being in the sweltering August heat, but she doesn't want to complain, lest one of the Peacekeepers grab her by the neck and break it, the way she wanted to twist Marcus's for his betrayal. Valencia is dressed lightly in a sheen, nearly see-through flowing white gown, her underwear beneath that, and she mindfully covers herself. She doesn't know how well the vision for a man underneath the Peacekeeper helmet is, but she can feel someone's eyes seizing hers.

"Bonnie? What are we doing out here?" she asks, her voice hardly rising above a whisper, as they've stood in a wind tunnel, there being an egregious amount of noise blowing through the terminal. Both her and Kevia's blonde hair are blowing in the wind, but hers, now a forever reminder of the Capitol's stain in the way it is dark as the unlit buildings in the city stays together, she having cut most of it and making it short, there being only tinier curls rather than the long extensions down her back.

The woman turns to her, and there's a wicked glean in her eyes, a chill racing through Valencia's body.

"There was something I wanted to discuss with you, something I needed Kevia here to be for," she says, cryptically.

"Here?" Valencia gestures to the terminal. "At three in the morning?" She very well is not happy being awoken without getting told any somesuch sort of details on why she is being awoken so roughly by Peacekeeper men, as the first thought that races through her head is treason, that she's betrayed them somehow, even though she has done nothing of the sort, and will always remain loyal... _always._ Her voice cracks at the idea, even though she said nothing aloud.

The woman's eyes narrow in on her like a snake seizing a deer, before clamping hard down on its neck with its jaws. Kevia stirs uncomfortably, arms crossed over, she in a robe, while Bonnie has dressed herself up, rather, in a placid periwinkle dress, cut off at the knees, frilly around the edges, and certainly not nightwear. "Valencia, just... _just_ listen to what she has to say," her old mentor pleads, and there's a hint of worry in her voice, but Kevia's gaze is focused solely on the barrel of the assault rifle clenched in a Peacekeeper's hand next to her.

Valencia's eyes dart to Kevia, hers widening, and a tightness begins to start at her sternum, expanding over her chest. The same feeling she felt in the Hall of Mystery both times, before Marcus fires his arrow and there's the splatter of scarlet with plumage sticking from Maisey's chest, and likewise as he advances on her when she backs up over a mirror, hallucinating his voice in her head until there's her own wave of her hand, breaking flesh and glass together. How like Kevia to tell her to just stick it through. That has been her mentor's mantra, as she's seen firsthand over the last eight months. To do what she's told. Her 'master's' bidding, and it seems it hails to Bonnie Rodney as her master.

A chill shoots up her arms, causing the hairs on the back of her neck to stick straight up. _Where's Calhoun? Where's the president? Where's the Head Gamemaker?_

Bonnie stands in front of her, arms crossed. "I brought you out here, Miss Shale, to tell you of your shortcomings. To punish you for your shortcomings."

"Shortcomings? Punish?" she says back at her, unable to comprehend what had just been said to her. "I don't understand, I-"

"Just _listen_ to her, Val," Kevia insists, wanting to step towards her, but the new victor backs up regardless.

There's the sharp whistle of the wind in the terminal, and the First Lady's unflinching stare - _"Madam President,_ " Valencia can hear the woman saying that, as that is what she accidentally calls her at the crowning ceremony, and Valencia throws it into the fire the first moment she gets - who has started to advance on her. "You discovered a terminal in the arena you were not supposed to have seen, and tried accessing a control panel to escape the arena..." Bonnie tilts her head to the side. "My husband has never been a man for the confrontational aspect of the presidency, so that is what I am here for..." she drawls out the sentence, and Valencia can imagine her tongue flickering and flapping in a reptilian motion. It'd almost fit perfectly. "What, Miss Shale, is it to be expected that other tributes watching saw you, a Career, from District 1, the heaviest and most devout of the districts, would try to escape the arena, and nearly _succeed_ , what would they think? Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis should not have let you live, and due to all the chaos, I might be speaking to Peri Florence here instead. These new tributes who would have been inspired by your attempt to escape, someone who should be fully devoted to the arena and the Capitol wish to flee, surely those who are not as entrenched would feel the same. Safe to say that, correct?" Valencia doesn't respond, her sensors for information seemed to no longer work, and she went into an unforeseen, sudden chill. "Correct?" Bonnie roars at her, and the new victor flinches.

"Answer her!" Kevia yells at Valencia, but her voice isn't one of anger, it is one of pleading, begging, the begging she must be so good at now.

"Correct..." but Valencia cannot bring herself to speak a sentence higher than a whisper.

Bonnie nods, seeming pleased by the affirmation. "So, Valencia, something must be done. A punishment for this treason must be inflicted."

" _Treason?"_ a panicked thought runs in the girl's head, but in the moment, she straights herself out, trying not to flinch, keeping her face stalwart. Unflinching. She is a Career, after all. Careers do not panic in the face of death. "So you dragged me out here to kill me, is that it? Madam President..." she hisses through clenched teeth, and she has to bite as hard as she can on her tongue to not then twist her face into a smile at the way a vein in Bonnie's head begins to pulse.

The woman shakes her head. "It would be the easiest course, Valencia," No longer 'Miss Shale', and the blood in her arms goes cold. "I like you too much to ever want to have to murder you," she lifts her head. "You, instead, will be murdering someone _else_ for me." Then, without turning back around, Bonnie barks out an order. "Bring them out into the open!"

Conjured out of nothingness, as if they hadn't been there before, three Peacekeepers step out behind two of the massive stone pillars erected in the terminal, two from the left, and one from the right. Valencia takes a step back, arms protectively raised, but the Peacekeepers aren't here for her, as they're dragging people behind them, and her heart seems to forget how to beat. Kevia has gone white beside her, but she dare not move closer to her, as the thought of being near her mentor sends awful chills up her spine.

Being pulled out from the shadows, somehow incapable of being detected, which must have been due to the wind overbearing most of the other noise in the terminal, were two victors, victors Valencia knew quite well, actually. Arizona Merviere from District 10, and Hale Cornerstone from District 2 being wrenched by Peacekeepers and forced to their knees, just a few feet away from the train tracks. Valencia has to hold in a gasp, and to try not to vomit, as there's a vicious smirk on Bonnie's face, perhaps the ugliest expression she has ever seen in her entire life.

Arizona is shirtless, seemingly covered in bruises, the man unable to keep his head up, which lolls back and forth from side to side. There is blood caking his face, running through his hair, surprising streams of cardinal amidst the murky brown, which then leads down his body. Valencia takes a second to drink his beauty in, as he is gorgeous, but she's unable to keep her eyes away from the horror. He's been beaten, and she knows that it must've been the two hardy gentlemen tugging him in tow.

Hale is in a much better condition, that only being a nasty, jagged cut from the left side of her face dotting its way down to her Adam's apple, it looking fresh, but it seemed to have stopped bleeding. Both of them have something obstructing their ability to speak, which the Peacekeepers undo out of both of their mouths, their arms tautly tied together and pulled back behind them, but nothing else seems to have been done to them. Valencia can hardly hear her own heartbeat above the wind tunnel.

"Ari!" Hale screams at the other victor.

"Hale!" he hollers back at her, he trying to scoot closer to her, the two about five feet or so apart, but a Peacekeeper grips him by the shoulders, forcing against the leathered leg.

Bonnie smiles at Valencia menacingly, before turning around to face the two victors kneeling before her. "Thought you could slip out and make it back home before I'd find out, would you?" she makes a disappointing noise in her throat. "I am always three steps ahead of everyone else playing this stupid political game, and you two are no exception..." Valencia notices that the First Lady is wearing heels, which, surprisingly, she can hear over the wind, over her thoughts, over her own heartbeat. "You might be wondering why I have had the two of you wrenched off of your train, restrained, bruised and battered... and why I have brought victors from District 1 with me to see you."

" _She's positively insane..._ " Valencia thinks to herself, noticing how close Bonnie is to the edge of the platform. The Peacekeepers are all trained on her, trained on the victors. She could... she could just _push her off..._

The new victor wants to move forward, she wants to be heroic, she wants to do the right thing, but she is incapable of moving, and Valencia has no better way to describe it.

The blonde woman is continuing her spiel. "Something I discovered, although I had already known, was that Arizona and Hale here were married. If you know anything about the laws of Panem, which victors of the Hunger Games still must adhere to, as they are still citizens, is that my husband, Calhoun wrote that it was forbidden for victors from different districts to marry, let alone have children. Our victors here of the 87th and 88th Games did both of those things! They broke two laws!" Bonnie is so full of vitriol that Valencia can see her spitting, her diamond eyes alight with mania in the golden haze of the lights above, which swing back and forth on precocious chains blowing in the breeze.

"You lie!" Arizona snarls at her.

"Don't deny it..." Kevia whispers, and Valencia sees that her old mentor is scratching at her arm, all resistance having dissipated somewhere hidden, perhaps having vanished long ago. "You'll only make it worse if you deny it."

"Kevia..." all the fight in Hale's body seems to evaporate.

The twinkle in Bonnie's eyes return, and Valencia is lost for words. "You two thought you were holding onto the deepest, darkest secret of your life... but it in fact was the worst kept secret in the Capitol. Not everyone in the Capitol knew, and believe it or not, Calhoun didn't," _Didn't,_ Valencia notes the past tense usage, and her heartbeat is picking up faster and faster. "Kevia was originally going to rat both of you out to me so I wouldn't punish her over stealing a necklace from me, but I already knew years before that. I looked at security footage of all the apartments in the Capitol, something I did to make sure I wouldn't see any treasonous activities happen. I've wanted to share this for years..." Valencia wants to throw up.

"Kill us then!" the male victor tries getting out of the Peacekeeper's grasp, but it is an unmovable force.

"Get it over with!" Hale likewise cries.

Bonnie closes her eyes, shaking her head. "Unfortunately, the two of you having an extramarital illegal affair isn't something that warrants murder. I'm not crazy," a devilish grin, somehow more wicked than the first one, crawls across her face. "However, the killing of Capitol officials can."

"What are you-" Valencia tries stepping forward, to interrupt.

The blonde woman is a swiveling mess on her heels, constantly rotating back and forth as she paces on the terminal, eyes wild, the power having gone to her head. "I found out tonight, that Head Gamemaker Lewlyn Davis and my husband and our president, Calhoun Rodney, were murdered, minutes of each other." Valencia's eyes widen, and she has to swallow down a gasp, but she sees Kevia jostle in her own stance, almost knocking into the Peacekeeper, not expecting that statement. "And what do I find leaving the Capitol, but Arizona and Hale together on the same train, shortly after the murders were discovered, and all because my husband and our Head Gamemaker discovered your secret, and to cover your tracks, you had them killed!"

"We didn't kill anybody!" Hale screams.

"Go to hell!" Arizona's face is twisted in murderous rage, and a Peacekeeper punches him deftly across the jaw, sending him sprawling onto the concrete, groaning in pain.

Valencia is trying to comprehend it all, but her mind is racing a mile a minute, and the tightness of her chest is expanding, expanding rapidly, which she clenches in one hand, unable to tear her eyes away from the scene. President Calhoun... _dead?_ Then- why are there no tears in Bonnie's eyes? Why hasn't she gotten all choked up over the passing of her husband?

Bonnie stands in the center of everyone, and Valencia sees she herself is positioned likewise in the same parallel as Hale, and Kevia is to Arizona, Bonnie triumphing and ruling over them all. She does not lift her head, and the new victor cannot see her face at the next command. "Bring the children up," she demands.

Hale's eyes widen, and it is her turn to try and fight for her freedom. "What have you done to them? What have you done to them?!"

There is movement to Valencia's left, and she turns to face a Peacekeeper bringing a pair of children into the center, right next to Bonnie, just in front of Kevia. Stunning children, really, but Valencia sees the resemblance immediately. The boy has Arizona's eyes, and the girl has Hale's chin, the two with the same dark, dark hair of their father's, and her heart sinks into her chest.

The blonde woman, who Valencia likes to keep as the epithet, it removes the aspect that makes her human, crouches down in front of the children. "What are their names?" she asks, facing them, but the direction of the question is behind her, back to the parents.

"Elias... Arianne!" Hale chokes out. "Please, please don't hurt them!"

"They're just children!" Arizona begs. "They haven't done anything wrong!"

Valencia senses movement in the tunnel, the sound of thunder trampling down the terminal. Bright, _bright_ lights envelop the tunnel, and the sound comes closer and closer. A train, perhaps the last one, a long arrival which would be from District 12, is coming into the station at the fastest speeds available to man, at the way the tunnel shakes. She realizes it before she can help it, and the girl is unable to hold her scream in.

"Kevia, please cover Elias and Arianne's eyes, they don't need to see this," Bonnie instructs, and then, with a voice as rigid as stone, "Throw Arizona in front of the train. Show everyone what I do to traitors."

There is chaos on the platform, as Kevia covers both the kids' eyes immediately, hugging them close to one another. Valencia is stuck in a position of helplessness, unsure of what to do, as Hale screams insults and cuss words at Bonnie, Arizona freaking out, trying to rip free of his bonds. Valencia is too late, too late to un-see.

A Peacekeeper hooks Arizona up by his tied hands, and the halcyon lights of the train burst into view, like a supernova making itself known on the night sky. Valencia tries looking away, a gasp coming from her throat, and Arizona is screaming, screaming on the wind, Hale is screaming his name likewise, and Bonnie is rigid, unmoving, a golem in the middle of the terminal.

Valencia will never be able to get the image out of her head, as she covers her vision with her hands, turning away for full effort, but she's late on the draw, and this is her torture, her mental torture that she cannot outlast.

The sight of Arizona being hit by a train going one hundred miles per hour, his body splattering on impact, and Hale's scream as she witnesses her husband die rising above the sudden screeching of the brakes.

* * *

 **...**

 **I'll be honest, I do not know how to start this closing AN for this chapter. This is something I knew I would do, something I was planning on from the very beginning, and was why I had the Capitol storyline be designed the way it was... all culminating at Chapter #49: Bonnie's Revolution, where Bonnie would completely upturn and overthrow the chess table that everyone is playing. All the signs, all the clues were there, but in my one fell stroke that I planned, Bonnie has wiped out our Head Gamemaker, our current president of Panem, and a popular victor for this particular fanon... oh how she revolutionized indeed.**

 **Not necessarily the happy ending I bet people are expecting, since I have thought about that, but with the announcement I will be adding on for the next chapter, for the _last_ chapter, this progression of story events will make sense in time. I must usher out the old, put it to rest, before allowing to invite in the new, and that is a famous Game of Thrones quote which I think heavily implies towards this story, for there will be new characters put on the rise.**

 **If I were to explain the contents of this chapter, I feel as if it'd ruin the effect. All I know is, even though this was planed, the fact I am still stunned and had to take breaks after writing each scene individually, that means I have crossed a point of no return, and it was this plot point, of Bonnie rising to power, that I knew I wanted to get Sheep Led to Slaughter off the ground, and then getting an amazing, _amazing_ group of tributes alongside it, has made it all the better. **

**Our next chapter, ladies and gentlemen, is the end, the end of Sheep Led to Slaughter, and there will be tears shed, tears I will be unable to hold in no matter how hard I try. The next chapter, #50: The Mute Hero, is the end of this SYOT, and the amount of pride I am currently feeling in my chest is unexplainable, and I have no other word for it, for how proud I am about this. I hope you all review, as I am so certain there is a reaction to the brutality and bringing down of the house that I have done with this chapter, but nonetheless, I'd love to hear it. Thank you all so much for reading! I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	50. The Mute Hero (Epilogue IV)

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Sheep Led to Slaughter, #50: The Mute Hero, and where this is the last time I get to say that phrase, as this, ladies and gentlemen, is the last chapter of this SYOT, the final chapter, where everything comes to an end... until I say it doesn't, but more on that later. I, first off, cannot believe I have reached this point in actually finishing an SYOT, as damn, these things are arduous and are definitely not easy to accomplish. I cried when we made it to the train rides, I cried after Interviews, I cried after the Bloodbath, I cried when Valencia became victor, and I am now crying as I write this last chapter, somewhere in the realm of 6k-9k because I can't seem to write short chapters for the life of me. Last time, on #49: Bonnie's Revolution, she _revolutionized_ the Capitol, and subsequently Panem.**

 **Lewlyn, our Head Gamemaker, murdered by her hands. Calhoun Rodney, her husband, and the current president, has revealed to him that their baby was not his, but Rennie's and that she had been cheating on him _and_ that she knew about the plan to end the Hunger Games, which she hated, and then shot Calhoun in the heart. Later, to force her hand and make Valencia scared shitless, she dragged out the victors Arizona Merviere and Hale Cornerstone, forced a lie about crimes they didn't commit, made Valencia watch, and then threw Arizona in the path of an on-coming train... Bonnie ain't messing around. In this ending chapter, from the characters that are alive in our Capitol storyline, which is eight of them, six will be shown in these scenes, and we will not see Hale or Pollux, their stories for this one are finished, done-zo. I hope you all enjoy Chapter #50: The Mute Hero.**

* * *

 ** _Lance Viel: Victor of the 79th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

He cannot bear to look at her, he cannot so as much toss a glance in his fellow victor's direction without wanting to hurl a barrage of insults at her, which, due to the current state of developments, might fit. It is back to where it all started, for all of them, in his Victors Village home, on the tiled kitchen. Where the lamb bites into his calf after he drunkenly steals one out of another victor's backyard, and she comes in, sees him entirely naked, and thus, the downfall.

All because of that _stupid_ jade necklace that she so desperately wanted.

Kevia is smoking a cigarette, indoors mind you, which means it's bad for the paint on the walls, but he knows that she doesn't care. She wouldn't, and she doesn't. He stands over by his kitchen counter, blowing off steam from his freshly made cup of coffee. All the while, as he then turns to her, to see Kevia propped up on one of his chairs, elbows resting over the shiny wood. Bile appears in his throat, which he swallows down.

"Do you have any idea what you've done?" he asks her, after a moment of silence passes, where he takes a long, satisfying sip of the coffee. The bitter liquid, there being no sugar in it, slides past his porcelain lips, scalding his throat, and scalding his tongue. Sores erupt down his esophagus line, where they burst and copper will be coughed up onto his pale fingertips. He'll smear the copper over Kevia's face, marking her in the doom she's caused.

"I did not come over here to be lectured at." Kevia takes a drag on the cigarette, blowing out the hazy white smoke, a trail that Lance follows with his eyes that floats up to the ceiling. He looks at it so he doesn't have to stare at her, to see the way there are dark circles underneath her eyes, because of course, _of course_ Kevia Janelle cannot sleep.

"Then why come over at all?" he moves to take a sip of the coffee, but he stills. Lance wants to throw it on her, to hear her scream and cry in unbearable pain, but a death in the fire would be too good for her at this point, he ganders. "I am certainly not going to be nice to you."

"I don't know what you want me to say," she snaps at him.

He wants to also snap her neck. Lance very well might do so, at this point he isn't sure. After all, it is Kevia's constant reminders to him on their afternoon walks through the botanical gardens, or at a required dinner with the royal family, that they're _Careers,_ and Careers are bred to cause violence, Careers are the ones who grab the swords of the walls first, charging headlong into the enemy. If it is in his very nature to become a brute, vicious villain, he can certainly play the part.

"Apologize!" he hisses at her, and he makes a motion to move towards her, which to her credit does not have her flinching out of terror as he'd expect - perhaps he has lost his touch - so he stands back towards the counter. "Apologize about what you've done! Own up to your mistakes, Kevia!"

"I haven't done anything wrong!" the victor protests back at him. He locks his jaw, seriously considering grabbing a steak knife off of the counter, perhaps the same blade that killed Emmett's poor sheep, and fighting her with it, like in the olden days when he has crisp blonde hair, zero scars, no nightmares that plague even the moments of daylight.

Lance raises an eyebrow, scoffing, despite his better intentions. She shoots a sharp glance at him, eyes set like the marble countertops, but he keeps shaking his head. "If you think you've done nothing wrong, Kevia, then you are dumber than I thought," he extends a hand out, the other pressing into his chest. "I used to think you were the stupidest girl alive..." a ball forms in his throat, and he shakes his head. "I used to think that I was just being unfair to you, being rude. Perhaps-" the air in his lungs leaves momentarily, catching on whatever tangibility is left. "Perhaps I was wrong."

"You weren't wrong..." Kevia whispers, but the noise is so quiet, it is almost as if she is speaking to herself.

He raises his head at her. "I'm sorry?"

"You weren't wrong..." she repeats herself, looking at him, and there's clear hurt reflected in her stare, a gaze directed towards him, piercing through him like a hot blade does to flesh, but this time, his hide is that of an armadillo's: impenetrable, impossible to be hurt, and it no longer works.

Another shake of his head, a telling, coy smile on Lance's face. "No, Kevia. That look of yours won't work this time," he drains the rest of his coffee into the kitchen sink. A good waste of rations, a good waste of coffee, but he doesn't care. The victor holds onto the porcelain as if it'd break, clenching his fingers around the cup. "You got a victor killed, their wife thrown in prison, and revealed to all of us what matters the most to you."

"I-" Kevia interrupts, to protest for _something,_ but he's over it.

"Arizona's dead!" Lance shouts at her, raising his voice, slamming the coffee mug on the counter, which shatters in his grip as he bombards the counter over and over again in the assault. She gasps, turning her head away, as porcelain shards fly everywhere, clattering onto the tiled floor. "Bonnie threw him in front of a _fucking_ train, Kevia! In front of his kids! In front of Hale! And you don't care!"

"I do, I just-"

"You lie!" he roars, marching directly up to her. She is incapable of looking him in the eye, her eyes falling everywhere else instead of on Lance. He steps closer to her, now to where he can feel her breathing against his chest. He is still holding onto one of the shards of the coffee mug, gripping it so hard that the serrated edges are beginning to dig into his fingers, cardinal seeping out and dripping onto the tiled floor. He forcibly places the shard in her hands, and Kevia looks up at him, eyes impossibly soft. "Take this with you," Lance instructs. "So maybe, when you're lying in bed tonight, thinking of what you've done, you'll cut your wrists and be done with it all," a look of disgust distorts his features. "I don't want to see you again except when I have to, Kevia. Get out."

She does not need to be told twice, Kevia holding onto the shard, keeping her gaze on it, just for a second looking up at him, but there's nothing else in his eyes except black pits, darkened souls that judge and the damned that are judged reflect back into the world, skin burning as ichor is poured into their eyes. The burn is immense, but it never brings anyone on to the brink of death. She grips onto the piece of the mug, and flees for the hills, dashing out of Lance's kitchen, back out into District 1, and as far as he is concerned, where he hopes she ends it all.

Panem doesn't need her around.

 _He_ doesn't need her around.

As his door clicks shut, and Kevia's heeled feet are heard running against the concrete back home, scurrying like the damned rat she is, Lance bowls over, hands tugging at his hair, and he unleashes a wicked scream, a scream so strong, it causes him to lose his voice.

* * *

 ** _Hector Merviere: Victor of the 77th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

He is too heartbroken to wipe away at the tears. Hector stands out on his terrace, overlooking the gorgeous lake, where the water glistens a sharp diamond as the sunlight hits it. Tears stream down his cheeks, crystalline rivers, but Hector keeps his hands firmly gripped on the wooden beam that is erected from the terrace, which extends a few inches from the ledge. It is a thirty foot drop from the side of his house down to the ground. It may be enough to break his neck in the fall, just maybe, but he's too much of a coward to do that. Too much afraid of pain to be willing to allow himself to leave in a moment of pain. He wants to go peacefully, but that won't happen now, will it?

The kids are gone. He knows this when Hailey bursts in in tears, screaming that Elias and Arianne are gone, disappeared from their beds as if they hadn't existed in the first place. Hector's heart hammers in his chest as he, Hailey, and the District mayor are combing the woods with flashlights, calling out his niece and nephew's names, but no one responds... just their echo among the trees, which rustle in the wind. Hailey collapses to her knees at this, he wrapping an arm around to comfort her, but there isn't any more he can do, she's not his wife. She isn't even Arizona's.

 _Arizona._

Hector breaks off a sob, lip quivering. His brother, dead and gone to the wind. Thrown in front of a train. He knows this, as Bonnie sends him a picture, a picture of Hale sobbing into her hands, and his brother, dead, the only reminder he had ever been alive being his favorite watch, shattered, links everywhere, still slightly intact from the impact, the metal drenched in blood. His brother is gone, his life, his everything that he lived for. No children. No significant other. Just... just his brother. Both parents have died due to unrelated health issues a few years apart from each other. He's the last Merviere left...

The kids are alright, Bonnie assures him, in the message, containing the details of how she's known all this time, and Calhoun didn't, of his brother's illicit marriage, his illegal marriage. Hale is alive too, but she takes out the well aspect of the greeting, as in the email, the word 'well' is written, except a line through it, and he can picture that woman, that demon smirking to herself behind her own computer back in the gilded palace typing this out. His sister-in-law has been thrown in a Capitol cell, incapable of being reintegrated into society after witnessing the Hunger Games, surviving them, being forced to kill innocents, and then years later, seeing her husband dashed against the side of a train, and there she'll stay, and there she'll stay. In a cell.

Hector has vomited seven times since he's woken up, and it has only been a few hours, only around ten in the morning, where he has replaced his coffee and water for whiskey, clutching a glass in his hands that is filled to the brim with the amber liquid. He brings the glass to his lips, taking a sip. What had it been that he said to Arizona, last, in the end?

He had spoken to him a couple of days ago, that he remembers, but the ending contents of the conversation are lost to him. The last time he's physically seen his brother had been back in that café when he left, during the final four, he's pretty certain... at how his life would be easier if his brother died in the arena instead of being a victor, gambling with the devil, playing with dice. Who is he kidding, though? Arizona is - _was,_ his mind bitterly corrects - a naïve man, like-minded in foolishness and heroism.

The victor knows he isn't safe, but he isn't sure if it is because he wouldn't be safe from tipping over the terrace edge and cracking his head on the hill, from Bonnie and her armored goons to take him away, or from the drink in his hand. It is Arizona that drove him to drink again, after being cold turkey for such a long time, that he does remember telling his brother. Guilt tripping him every second of the way, making sure he knew whose it fault it had been when the foundations of the house came collapsing around them. The Merviere name dragged through the dirt, ruined, collecting dust in the corner like an abandoned knickknack.

The next shot of liquor does not go easy down his throat, Hector coughing, as if his lungs were about to rupture out of his chest. He wipes at the back of his mouth, one of the droplets falling onto his hand, like condensation. If he stares at the droplet hard enough, focusing his gaze on it with the deepest strength he can muster, it changes color, to the vermillion color of blood, a faint hint of copper riding the air, foul is the smell of a corpse, a corpse left out to rot in the sun.

Did Arizona fear for anyone else in his last moments, when Bonnie gave the order? Had he just been entirely focused on himself?

Hector finally brings one hand to wipe at his tears. The terrace is quiet, the lake is quiet, but building on the edge, as if climbing vertically up the horizon, he can hear it. A rumble in the deep, similar to thunder crackling over the pastures. He smirks to himself, taking another sip of the whiskey. "And so it begins..." he whispers to himself, and the smirk elongates into a smile.

He extends the glass out towards the heavens, and the grin widens further, the tears spilling down, spilling down with such ferocity that his eyes hurt, they sting and he wants to wipe at them, but he'll bear the pain. "This one is for you, brother," he says, this time mustering the courage to speak louder, as the thundering gets closer, where he can hear it clearly over his house.

Tires screeching to a halt. Feet, feet cloaked in heavy boots actually, clomping down onto the ground, crunching the gravel. A man's voice very well known to his ears, as Head Peacekeeper Lazarus Pietro.

Hector downs the rest of his drink, holding the empty glass close to his chest, before bursting into tears, curling in on himself, as Peacekeepers line his house, surrounding the front half of the Victors Village home, before blasting the door open, flooding in like a swarm of ants.

He feels the jolts of electricity travel up his body before the taser even touches the back of his neck, but the glass falls out of Hector's hand onto the terrace, shattering. The victor collapses, head colliding semi-forcefully into the stone. His hands are drawn back behind him, handcuffed together. Head Peacekeeper Lazarus is seen in position, leaning over him, stuffing a cloth into his mouth, but Hector has used up all of his fight, all of his restraint... he had drunken it away.

A black bag is thrown over his head, obstructing his vision.

Black ants burrow into his eyes, and Hector cannot remember any more.

* * *

 ** _Valencia Shale: Victor of the 100th Hunger Games P.O.V_**

* * *

It is the scream that she plays in her head over and over again, it is _Hale's_ scream that makes her incapable of sleeping the rest of the evening. How can she? Witnessing a man getting thrown against a train... death in the arena felt awful, but for some reason, for Valencia, seeing a victor bleed the same color red as the rest shocks her, as if the victors who have survived the Hunger Games do not bleed any longer, saved from that devastating fate. She returns back to her apartment, having run away from Kevia, running for her life, making sure she's alone, as if she's being chased by her evil counterpart, as if they had stepped out of the Hall of Horrors which tortured her Persephone like so.

She holds onto the other pillow opposite her, one propping her head up, giving her the room to breathe. The pillow is moist the next morning, her saliva and tears having dried, causing the outer edge to be a dark gray compared to the sky blue of the pillow. There's a knock at her door, and she hitches the sheet close up to her, and somehow, Valencia finds the strength to speak. Her voice hurts from the screaming, from the crying.

" _Go away!"_ _she yells at the stranger._

 _"Missus Shale," it is some Capitol official, she doesn't know who, who is speaking to her, a voice she does not recognize. "Bonnie Rodney would like to speak with you. She has requested for an audience. I would not refuse."_

Valencia has seen firsthand what refusal to Bonnie's demands mean, which is being trapped in the iron manacles of death. She refuses to be walked up to the executioner's block. She recalls, rather mistily, as it is rather late in the afternoon now, somewhere nearing three thirty, and she's been asleep or crying this entire time, opening to the door to a plainly dressed man, in an unremarkable suit and tie, slicked back dark hair, and a fake smile forcing his features up. The instructions are plain and simple, to switch into an outfit much more pleasing to the eye - if she had her sword, she'd have skewered him through the liver and out the back - and to follow him to the presidential mansion.

She cannot help herself, as her eyes impeccably widen at the idea. The presidential mansion, a place she has always been dying to see, and she's being invited to go, and by the sounds of it, just her alone. Just twenty minutes later, she is trailing behind the gentleman, a name she does not catch, but frankly she feels it is rather irrelevant. Valencia is ushered inside through the massive oak wood doors, adorned by a gorgeous combination of the Panemian red and gold banners, the logo plastered in the center, and her mouth goes dry as she looks at it.

That logo is a representation of what she's done. A representation of who she has killed, and who has died for her to be where she is.

"Better me than them..." she whispers to herself, one hand clenched around the other, nails digging into the spots of vacancy where her knuckles have space to breathe. If she were to drag her fingers any harder, she is certain that blood would appear. Maybe it'd cause the servant in front of her - that is what he is, she debases him slightly, as he'll do whoever's bidding as long as it gets him free, as long as it keeps him safe, he wouldn't want to go against the flame - to actually pay attention to her, as there is zero small talk between the two of them, she just following behind like a little duck, paying attention to mother's orders.

The man drags her through room after room of opulence, with glass chandeliers every few feet, dancing with pockets of sunshine in the pillars of light. Valencia is unsure of where her eyes should land, admiring the carpets of many colors, or to stare out the windows and see her reflection distorted in a carmine light, where her eyes pop with violet auroras, as her skin glimmers an oceanic green, fish scales that combine and clutter with one another. There is a delectable smell on the air, like freshly baked cookies, which has her smiling the entire way through, which is oddly put in a backdrop by the sound of Arizona's scream clattering with the train.

She frowns to herself, slightly, in case the man could sense a moment of faulting disposition, as they make their way towards the largest living room in the mansion. Valencia comes to a halt when the man stops abruptly, turning to her, and his face has changed colors from a more anemic white to a rather serene pearl color, as if being in the mansion revitalizes some of his spirit back to him, which sounds odd and ridiculous when she vocalizes the thought. The new victor is instructed to wait in the living room, and the man bustles off without paying her another glance.

"Probably don't deserve it," Valencia mutters, and she holds her hands behind her back, looking around.

In the far right corner, next to a bookshelf, there's a man, or a woman, she isn't exactly sure what gender they are, bent over, scrubbing the wood with a sponge, a heavy thick line of yellow tape, like the body of a hornet, strapped across the bookshelf, and Valencia's mind saddens at the thought of what the tape would be doing to the book spines, wearing them away, destroying them in a way only the Capitol would know how. One of the books seems an odd red that she hasn't seen before, but as Valencia stands a bit closer, she's hit with the smell of copper, the intense odor catching her by surprise.

 _Blood._

She gasps, backing away from the bookcase, but if the worker notices, they don't lift their head and pay her any attention. Did- did someone _die_ in this living room? Valencia looks around fearfully, hands going to her waist, but she remembers that this isn't an arena any longer. There is no sword for her to grasp, no weapon for her to use if she needs to defend herself against Peacekeepers. What would a sword do against bullets from an assault rifle? She has no idea what it feels like to be shot, picturing grotesquely a bullet entering her flesh, splattering and mangling her insides, but Valencia bites down on her tongue as hard as she can, disrupting the memory.

There's a voice riding the wind, and she thinks it is hers for a minute, hearing a feminine drawl to it. Valencia feels her cheeks flush, a liquidity flowing in the basin of her mouth, and when she unclenches her teeth from her tongue, there's a scarlet tint to the already vermillion hued appendage. The woman's voice comes again, startling her.

"Valencia, darling?" the woman's voice comes again, to her left. The victor turns towards the sweetness that ebbs. "You may join me now."

The voice belongs to no other than Bonnie Rodney, the woman standing in the doorway of what looks like to be an office of sorts, heralded by another pair of wooden oak doors. She is dressed in a flowing white dress, and Valencia notices how it almost looked like what she had been wearing last night when she had been standing on the train platform, but she throws the thought away as quick as it arrives. Bonnie's lemonade hair is down and curly, resting against her shoulders, and there's a warmth spread across her face.

A warmth Valencia does not trust; she expects it to change to something icy cold the moment she steps near her.

The victor swallows, her throat heavy, clumped together as if she inhaled a ball of moss. "Yes ma'am," and there's the pique of Bonnie's eyebrows. A respect for her. Perhaps not many respect her.

Bonnie steps back into the office, and Valencia follows, like the man she made fun of, as she wants to live too. She steps in, crossing over the threshold as if she has marked her way into sacred territory. Valencia stops for a second, while Bonnie continues, making her way around to the front of the desk. Oak wood, as per usual, it seems, for everything in this mansion. She looks around at the artifacts sitting on the table, gorgeous and gleaming gem sculptures, one made of topaz and sapphires, and another entirely composed of rubies, glimmering vermillion in the sunlight, as the blinds are open, light streaming in.

There are two chairs on the opposite side of Bonnie's, which is leather and spins, while the other two are solidary, meant to be focused and facing only one direction. The backs of the chairs are covered in velvet, something she has never touched before, and Valencia steps closer to the two objects, running her fingers atop the surface. Her fingertips melt at the touch, sensuous, and she senses a hallelujah behind her eyelids, flashes of sulfur and smoke and delight.

"Valencia, I said you can sit down now," Bonnie says to her, having watched this play out on the victor's face.

Her face flushes with embarrassment, scarlet seeping to the tips of her scalp. Her cheeks burn, and Valencia takes a seat in the right chair, having felt she has taken the left path far too often in life. "Sorry, Madam President, I-" and she stops herself. What _is_ Bonnie now? If everything is to be believed, Calhoun, the current president is dead, and no child older than sixteen, with the daughter being three weeks old...

"No, you're correct," Bonnie smiles, and this is unlike the woman she had seen last night throwing old victors into trains and such. "With my husband gone, I am indeed Madam President. Only person in the family to succeed him."

"And how long would that be for?" Valencia's tone has an edge to it, a supplicant for fighting, an effort she did not know existed in her, by the way Bonnie's upper lip twitches.

"Unsure to say for how long. Maybe indefinitely. Perhaps until my daughter comes of age," the blonde woman begins picking at her fingernails. "What of it, Valencia?"

"I'm- I'm just curious..."

Bonnie looks at her with vampiric vision, azure eyes turned a sour brick color that pierce through flesh, bone, grim and mortar, leaving Valencia a desolate skeleton. She sits up, pushing her chair in some to the desk, which squeaks and the force of her causes a picture facing Bonnie to fall flat onto its back, the contents staring up at the victor's face. A man, a very recognizable man. _Calhoun._ The president - ex-president, now, Valencia has to remind herself with a kick to the back of her own leg - is in her line of vision, the man's arms folded over one another as he sits back in the same chair, in the same office. _His_ office.

The older woman clears her throat, looking down at the desk for a moment. "I wanted to apologize about last night, as I-"

"Your husband kept a picture of him on his desk?" Valencia blurts out the question before she can help it, and Bonnie freezes, lips pursed together, eyes narrowing in on her akin to a leopard staring down a deer through a savannah. "That doesn't seem weird?"

Bonnie closes her eyes for a moment, with her fingers keeping the lids shut, as if she were warding out an extremely bright light and doing so successfully. "Yes," she says, after a moment of resignation when she drops her fingers, instead tapping them on the side of the desk. "Calhoun kept a picture of himself on his desk. He told me it reminds him of what position he was in and what it meant for us and our future," she sighs, but keeps her eyes open, which flash a sharp jade. "Always focused on his legacy, a legacy that is now mine, unfortunately."

"I'm sorry," Valencia says, but she doesn't believe it. She doesn't believe, deep down, that Hale and Arizona would kill the president, let alone the Head Gamemaker. Perhaps someone else who had felt to go on an odd revenge streak, but nothing detailing anything like this, and it drops a pit into her stomach, a pit of bitter acid. "I'm sorry that Calhoun is gone. I thought he was a good man," she tells her outwardly, and then inwardly, " _He deserved to die like all the rest. Like all of you, for throwing me in here and making me fight to the death. A good man wouldn't force this on us..._ "

There's a pause, a light catching in Bonnie's eyes - Valencia couldn't call her the president, at least not yet, if not ever, it felt too strange - but then it dissipates as if it never existed. "I wanted to apologize, Valencia, about earlier this morning, for having put you through that."

Valencia swallows a brick into her stomach. "Whatever you have to do, ma'am," and the usage of ma'am draws Bonnie's eyebrows together, and unfortunately she is incapable of stopping the spreading smirk that glides across her own face. Found what makes her tick, huh?

"I needed to prove your loyalty. Kevia showed her mine, and with Hale and Arizona both disobeying the law and doing what they've done..." she shakes her head. "I just needed to be sure."

"Am I in trouble?"

Bonnie raises an eyebrow, and there's a smirk on her face now. "What would make you think you were in any sort of trouble?"

"I got invited into your husband's... _your,_ " she corrects hastily, the way Bonnie's face wavers on its composure for a second, "Office, and I know I am not on anyone's good side, for what you told me last night. Almost escaped the arena... I got out of ignoring Pollux and refusing to do an interview. I- I can't be in the hottest bucket of water right now."

The blonde sits back in her chair, both hands now extended to the desk, and she taps, _taps_ away, tapping harder and harder with each passing beat, but Valencia keeps her head still, gaze straight and directly into Madam President's eyes, for if she shows any sign of weaknesses, then Bonnie has won. This isn't the time to let Bonnie win, if she is sitting in power now.

Bonnie laughs to herself, a quiet laugh, but one filled with mirth all the same. "Sweetheart, if I wanted you killed, I would have had my husband do it long ago, such as the moment you were crowned. No, you aren't in trouble," there's a hesitant pause, but she does not add more to that; Valencia doesn't need to hear her say anything else, the message is clear enough. _Not yet, at least._ "I needed to speak with you, as there's something I want to ask you."

Valencia sits up straight, having started to slouch in her chair. She can hear Persephone in her head, placing a warm finger under her chin, forcing her to move, forcing her to keep at attention, with perfume interlaced in her hair. This life, this victor life, it shouldn't be meant for Valencia. It needs to be for Persephone, who never found confidence in herself, or for Milor who had a battle at home to win, or for Carrion to walk away from alcohol forever... but now here she is, with zero trouble in her life, facing down the barrel of a gun held by the devil herself.

"Anything, ma'am," and there's the twitch of the lip once again, coupled with an eyebrow twitch too. Mission accomplished.

Bonnie crosses her hands together, having ceased that godawful tapping. "With my husband dead, and me jumping into the spot of president, it leaves the spot of a mutts designer open. With Lewlyn Davis's death, as Head Gamemaker, her spot is forfeit too. There is Lewlyn's brother, who knows some of the ins and outs of being a Gamemaker, but he is a mute, and that would not work. Pollux Aetos, who I know you are not on good terms with, has tried to walk away from the Capitol administrative lifestyle, which effectively means I might have lost my Master of Ceremonies position," a ball forms in Valencia's throat. She can see where this is going, just like Arizona being thrown in front of a train. "With the victor situation, Hale has been thrown into prison because of her crimes and treason. Arizona is dead, and his brother Hector has been found guilty of being an accomplice... thus rendering District 10 without a mentor, something I hate to do to those poor tributes," Bonnie inhales, and there's a moment of peace passed between the two women. "Lance has volunteered to mentor for the District 10 tributes in their steads, and there are victors in Two to rush to fill Hale's position. Kevia and that other male Career victor..."

"Emmett," Valencia's throat is dry and parched, as if she's been out in the sun all day long, chained to a post.

"Emmett, right," Bonnie nods her head. "He and Kevia can fill Lance's void. I need you, Valencia."

She doesn't understand. None of this makes sense.

She just won.

Valencia is still seventeen.

How does any of this apply to her in the slightest? "Madam President, I don't-"

"I need you, Valencia, to take a position here in the Capitol," and the blonde woman shifts her hands to pressing one atop Valencia's, the flesh cold and shocking to feel. "I have found myself to become enamored by you and-"

She removes her hand in shock, recoiling away, and a pang of dread ripples through Valencia, where she can feel it stab at her heart, making her bleed. _Bonnie is in love with her?_ Panic flashes in the victor's eyes. Her heart had been for Persephone, if some other woman had been supposed to steal it away. Not _her._ Never her! She can't possibly be... no, there's some mistake.

"Madam President," Valencia's voice is hushed, yet terrified. "You cannot be serious. You can't be in love with me, I-"

"I'm not in love with you," Bonnie whispers quietly, removing her hand too, placing it back in her lap. "I will always be married to Calhoun whether it be in life or in death." There's a flash of something. Regret? Valencia isn't sure. "He was my husband, and I loved him, and he loved me, and the world took him away from me," there are tears starting to come clear in the woman's eyes, and Valencia wants to run, to run back to the emerald hills of District One. "Regardless, Valencia, I am not in love with you. There are just... qualities in you that have made you noticeable to me. Be it your leadership, or your courage, or your fearlessness, or your strength... you have a good heart," a perceptible shake of the head. "Everything I feel I am not."

Valencia brings her hands back to the table, feeling the coarseness of the wood, as the sunlight no longer feels warm on her skin, but scorching, as if a dragon is breathing fire alongside her back, igniting the tips of her hair. "Then what is it you ask of me?"

A quip of a smile lands on Bonnie's face, but it is only there for a second, no longer than that. "I want you to stay here in the Capitol, to stay here in the mansion, with me," Valencia's eyes widen, but too in shock to utter any sort of protest back. "Live here, in the mansion. I don't necessarily need you to become Head Gamemaker or learn how to design mutts, or even be the next Pollux Aetos, but I want you here. I want you here, with me, under my wing, under my tutelage..." another slight pause, and Bonnie exhales, her body visibly brightening. "My apprentice, if you will. Should everything go smoothly, because you could be the successor to Panem's future."

She forgets how to speak, for a moment.

The opportunity to become the president of Panem?

Did a Career ever have this sort of opportunity before?

"And- and what if I refuse?" her voice hardly rises above that of a dormouse.

"Then you refuse," Bonnie replies simply, with a wry smile, but Valencia doesn't feel it is so. "I cannot force you, Valencia to do anything. I would not kill you or punish you for refusing."

Valencia sits back on her chair, teeth nipping at the inside of her cheek, pouring away scarlet. A bandage being torn open. Persephone is going to be disappointed in her, she already knows, but it doesn't matter anymore. Persephone Castor is dead, and Valencia Shale isn't. Better be safe than sorry. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Her heart races in her chest, pulse quickening, pupils widening, chills lacing her spine, snapping things in place, and shattering others.

"I'll do it, Madam President," she says, voice confident, zero wavering. "I'll stay."

* * *

 ** _The Mute Hero_**

* * *

He holds the red violin in his hands, wood crackling underneath his grip as he crushes it. Rennie's throat burns with the gasps he emits, croaks that do nothing other than vanish like phantoms, echoing in Lewlyn's tone against the corners of the room. His cheeks are stained with the crystalline, salty feel of tears that mingle in his throat, adding an extra pain to the burn.

The curtains are drawn shut. His door is locked. He took out every knife in his kitchen, setting them around the house in case anyone came barging in.

His sister is dead. His sister is gone, the woman he _loved,_ throat slit as she lay relaxing in a tub, believing it to be him, as that is the last thing he recalls, as he tries rushing over to her apartment to see her, when there are several Peacekeepers already there, Lazarus forcing him back, saying there's been a murder, and he doesn't need anyone else to say anything.

Rennie crumples to his knees, hitting them on the carpet at such a force where they could have shattered, a silent sob escaping his throat. No one goes to give him a hug, or to ask if he is alright. He sits in the hallway, numbly, while tears spill down his cheeks, and the Peacekeepers are doing their business, cleaning up the scene, and only when he asks Lazarus hours later, in the dead of the morning, nearing around seven or so where the sun peeks over the clouds does he find out the truth.

Cut from ear to ear as if she had been some piece of meat to filet. Throat torn open like wrapping paper for gifts on Christmas morning.

He knows who has done it.

There's no other person who could have killed his sister.

 _Bonnie._

His lips form her name, with no semblance of sound coming out, but every time he vocalizes it in his head, the vocalization gets louder, and louder, _and louder,_ until Rennie has stood up in the middle of his apartment, slamming his fists onto every counter he can think of. What had it been that Bonnie said to him, the morning she tried to kiss him?

" _I want to slit your sister's throat..." Bonnie growls._

 _"Get in line..." he had hastily replied, through his messaging tablet._

Rennie, the moment he realizes this, goes for his violin, almost about to smash it into a wall when he freezes. Smashing his sister's gift wouldn't bring anything else other than pain into his life, wouldn't it? He shakes his head, setting the instrument down, and his eyes roam the room. It is no longer Bonnie Rodney, his boss, the woman who designed the mutts. It is Bonnie Rodney, Madam President of Panem.

That means Calhoun is dead, a thought that sits in his skull like the bitterness of wine. A man he felt ambivalent about, but clearly with a good heart. He had to have died at her hands too, a wife killing a husband, with a child that had been theirs. Such a sweet girl, riddled and plagued by death and lies and scheming. When he gets a good look at the child, he frowns, having listened to the report the doctor had given them.

He didn't know Calhoun had the genetics for red hair, but he knew Bonnie did.

Now, in his apartment, shrouded in darkness, Rennie sets his violin down on the ground, leaving one hand to rest on the bowstrings, which he wishes to pluck, trying to mimic Lewlyn's voice. His computer is open, the camera directed at him. He thinks, although just for a second, to use the bow and slice it across his throat, to go out the same way his sister did, in an act of protest, an act of poetic justice.

However, as he stares at his violin, with the red paint getting eerier and eerier by the second, and at the camera, it hits him.

What he should do.

The reaping is in a week, where everyone in all the districts is forced together at around the same time to look at the screens and watch a Capitol film about war and why the Hunger Games are a necessity. A feat that his sister, and Calhoun would have ended, a system that Bonnie surely wants to keep in, for it means she's sitting at the high table, ordering everyone else what to do.

Pollux, who he can convince to stay, just for the week... he would hold onto the film.

Rennie's brain catches a match, and it ignites, off to the races his thoughts leap.

He sits up, straightening his back, moving the screen a bit higher, and he grabs his tablet. If he does this, there is no turning back, there is no way he'll be safe after uploading it, after submitting it, after any of it. Bonnie will want his blood, and he'll cut _her_ throat open from ear to ear. He is more savvy than he lets on, as Pollux has told everyone any chance he gets.

The ex-Avox reaches for his tablet, turning it on, and then presses record on his camera screen, where he sees his reflection, his bright oceanic eyes, and that sharp red hair appear on screen.

He types something into the tablet, and then turns the tablet towards the screen.

" _You've been lied to,_ " is what reads on the tablet, and Rennie's lips curve into a smile.

If it is a war Bonnie wants to play at, it is a war Bonnie will receive.

 _"Game on..._ " Rennie thinks to himself, smiling with relish. " _Game on. Checkmate..._ "

* * *

 _Coming Soon - Date TBA_

 _Sheep Led to Slaughter SYOT Sequel -_ ** _Bombs and Bullets: A Hunger Games SYOT of the 101st Hunger Games_**

* * *

 **Well, ladies and gentlemen, this is it. We have reached the end of Sheep Led to Slaughter, a Hunger Games SYOT, and we're done, we have reached it, the end of Chapter #50: The Mute Hero. I am now sobbing tears of joy. It has taken me, now, six attempts, to actually finish an SYOT, and I am done, I have actually done it... I have actually done it, and I don't know what to do. I don't know how to proceed.**

 **It has only taken me eight months, and thirteen days, to write this entire story. 363k words later, fifty chapters later, and my first accomplished, completed SYOT, with two full storylines featuring thirty-four characters across the board that merged in the end... I have never felt prouder of myself, and the fact that, yes, ladies and gentlemen, there will be a sequel to this story, it is called Bombs and Bullets, and it is going to be crazy, crazier than anything else I think I have ever done, because this will be more than just any old SYOT featuring tributes in an arena. This will be an all out war.**

 **Now, I like to always do this for stories of this magnitude, that if you are to review, I like to ask questions and garner your responses. I'd greatly appreciate it, as it helps me in case I need to go back and edit, fix things, stuff like that.**

 **1) Favorite moment of the tribute storyline, focusing on the arena? Least favorite moment of the tribute storyline?**

 **2) Favorite moment of the Capitol storyline, focusing on my ten OC characters I created? Least favorite moment of the tribute storyline?**

 **3) Who were your top three and bottom three tributes in the arena?**

 **4) Who was your favorite and least favorite OC Capitol storyline character?**

 **5) Favorite chapter title of the story?**

 **6) Shall I see you submitting a tribute or other character for _Bombs and Bullets_ when the time comes around? **

**7) Anything else you'd like to add, if you wish.**

 **Of course, I'd greatly appreciate if you all would do this for me, especially considering this is the first time I have ever reached a point like this in my fanfiction writing time on this website, and we've only just begun. I am not sure when I will have the first chapter, the prologue section for _Bombs and Bullets_ ready, but I do have a story in another fandom that I have been neglecting for a whole year that has four chapters left that I need to finish, and I am also starting another Hunger Games story for a completely different series based on an OC character of mine, a series named The Gamemakers Plan, that I am currently in the process of rewriting Parts I and II, and then starting Part III sometime this fall, but I will definitely try to have the prologue of _Bombs and Bullets_ ready by an October date, and submissions starting for that too.**

 **I want to say thank you to every single submitter that helped me get to this point, because the tributes they created were the life of this story, and to Audmirable, the amazing designer of Valencia, whom I love dearly. Thank you to all the silent readers and non-tribute creator reviewers I have received, as this story has catapulted into the 10000 view range, something I do not have happen very often. With all of this, I say thank you so much, and I love you all so much! Please, oh please, review, PM me, do whatever! I will see you all again for _Bombs and Bullets,_ something I cannot wait for. Have an amazing day! I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


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